


The Rory Chronicles

by mischiefreblogged



Series: The Klory Chronicles [1]
Category: Glee
Genre: Gen, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-30
Updated: 2012-08-30
Packaged: 2017-11-13 05:02:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 21,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/499783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mischiefreblogged/pseuds/mischiefreblogged
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rory Flanagan is not in fact an exchange student from Ireland. Here's his real story.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Part 1 of a series, spawning from the fact that Blaine looked way too moved and touched and in love with Rory's performance at the end of Pot O' Gold. And the fandom's decision that Rory Flanagan and Sugar Motta were probably future children of Klaine and Britanna respectively. 
> 
> This story is written as serious as one possibly can when discussing time travel and grandfather paradox in relation to a TV show about a Glee Club.

So here’s what you missed.

Rory Flanagen isn’t actully Rory Flanagen and is apparently from the future who has some how travelled back in time thanks to his Aunt Britney and some sort of voodoo magic something.

Rory’s sort of kind of in love with 18 year old Britney so he pretends to be a Leprechaun but then Santana scared the crap out of him and he’s not sure he’ll ever be able to look her in the face again.

At least Finn’s agreed to be his friend so something’s going right.

And that’s what you missed on Glee.


	2. Take Care of Yourself

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rory's been at McKinley for a full week and this is the first time he's been even the least bit truthful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Pot O' Gold. Italics taken directly from canon dialogue.

_“If you don’t mind, I’d like to dedicate this song to my family, who I miss so much.”_

It’s the first time in over a week that he’s told the truth. He misses his family so much. He thought he could compartmentalize it all when Finn asked him to join Glee. He was sure he could walk into the choir room and not get emotional.

He’s spent a week literally becoming Rory Flanagan. He has it nailed. He talks about Mass (he’s never been), his accent is flawless and he’s actually starting to believe that maybe he actually is an Irish exchange student.

He starts the song, thinking about his parents back home in the future, not the teenage versions that are in this room right now, because those aren’t really his parents because he doesn’t exist yet.

_And no more tears to cry, I’m out of goodbyes._

And then he makes the mistake of looking straight at Blaine. He doesn’t mean to. His eyes just slide naturally from Quinn to Mike and Tina and then up to his Papa and he almost loses it for a second but he grins his way through it as he reaches into his upper register.

Blaine’s eyebrows shoot up towards his hair line and he looks proud and impressed and Rory means every syllable when he sings  _I love you_.

He’s barely stopping himself from crying now. Years of theatre and two professional performer parents is all that stops the tears from coming.

Rachel fidgets in the back row, elbowing Kurt and he catches Dad’s eye. Dad, who taught him the high note that he’s killing right now.His voice nearly cracks at the thought, but he pulls through.

He doesn’t know why he’s here, and he wants his dads so badly, but maybe he can make it through because his dads look impressed and proud of him even when they don’t know it’s him.   
  
He’ll make them proud, because he knows in that moment that he’ll always be their Rory whether they know it or not.


	3. The Dodgeball Incident

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hummel-Anderson's stand up for others, don't bully and don't play dodgeball. Rory's about to break all those rules.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Mash-off. Italics taken directly from canon dialogue.

As long as Rory lives he’ll never forget his Papa dancing to Hot for Teacher.   

  
He’s seen Papa dance like an idiot before (it’d be impossible not to, he’s lived with him his whole life), he did play Mark Cohen in  _RENT_  for almost as long as Anthony Rapp himself, but this is amazingly fantastically unforgettable.     
He keeps sneaking looks back at Dad and Dad’s got this strange look on his face that Rory knows is good but can’t place.    
 His heart swells seeing them both so happy because he knows that High School wasn’t always great for them.     
When he gets home he’s going to remind them of the good times they had they obviously had in High School.  
  Somehow.   
Without you know, greatly altering some time space continuum and thus rendering himself out of existence. ________________________________________    
   
They face off against the Troubletones on the stage and he naturally gravitates towards Papa because he’s still a little terrified of Santana and she’s just so mean to Finn.  

Blaine gives him a strange little smile, like he’s not sure why Rory is standing so close to him suddenly and Rory shifts away, remembering they don’t know him.  

He loses himself in the song and the idea of Mash Ups and tries not to let the unintentional rejection hurt too much.   
_________________________________________   
   
 He can’t help it, he hovers near them at all times now. In the choir room Dad is looking out the window with Quinn and Papa is up there with him and Rory decides he’ll go look too (oh God it’s like being a little kid all over again, wanting to bond with them so badly).  Kurt gives him the strangest look as he comes over and then Mr. Schue comes in and they get down and Rory hastily takes a seat at the very back to save face.    
 He stares just over Papa’s head as everyone calls out names of bands. He doesn’t say anything for fear of saying something completely wrong.      
 If anyone asks, he’ll just say that it’s because he’s Irish and knows nothing about American music.   
Then Finn suggests Hall and Oates (seriously? That band is beyond old and not just because Rory is a good 20 years out of his own time) and that the new guy should sing and Rory almost grins because finally, finally Finn is going to stop this odd, completely out of character cold war thing with Papa.  
  (He didn’t notice it at first, but then Finn just kept dropping it into conversation about how Blaine was like taking his role as leader of Glee and Rory just can’t come to grips with this because Finn is his cool Uncle who loves Papa back home and they have awkward rock ballad sing-offs and the three of them gorge themselves on Dad’s baking and watch football on Sundays with Grandpa Burt.)     
   
“Rory I think you’ll do a good job.”     
That was not what he was expecting. He gives it all of two seconds thought (enough time to remember to do his accent) and declines.     
Papa turns suddenly and Rory tries to keep his face neutral.     
  “Come on.” he says, and his eyes show 100% faith and support and seriously Rory is not prepared for this. “You’re totally ready Rory, you’ll kill it. We’ll all help you.”     
  He turns back around before he can see the look on Rory’s face, bemused at first, then a big beaming smile because even 20 years in the past his Papa believes in him.  ________________________________    
He’s still hanging out with Finn mostly, which is cool because he and Finn are close in the future too. He tells him not to listen to Santana because he knows how much Finn worried about his weight in High School (the number of times he tells Rory not to worry how he looks and  _ **You Matter**_  is basically the family motto).    
 And then Finn talks about trash talk and Rory pretends that there’s no such thing in Ireland because he absolutely sucks at insults.     
  (He gets it from Papa who probably has never insulted anyone in his whole life. Some days he wishes he had his Dad’s biting sarcasm.)   
   It shows minutes later how much he actually sucks at the insult game when the phrase “You’re skinny, like all the crops failed on your family’s farm” tumbles out of his mouth (at least it sounds Irish, maybe there is some kernel of hope for his biting wit).     
  Then Finn’s proposing dodgeball and Rory can’t help but internally freak out.  
   He’s never been allowed to play dodgeball in his entire life. According to Dad, no Hummel will ever, ever play dodgeball again.    
  He’s fucked.   
_________________________________    
He pretends to not know the rules of the game to get out of it, but that doesn’t work and he finds himself in the most aggressive game of dodgeball probably ever played (not that he’d know, having literally been instructed to sit out of every game since kindergarten).    
He spends most of it hiding behind people and just trying not to die.    
  Finally, mercifully, it’s over as Santana nails Finn in the face (what is her problem anyways). He goes over, glad it’s finally done and says the first vaguely Irish thing that comes out of his mouth and suddenly there are balls flying at him and he goes down hard.    
   “STOP IT! STOP IT!” he looks up and Dad’s got his arm around him and for a second he’s so disoriented and confused that he doesn’t know whether he’s in the past or the future.    
 “For Godsakes he’s bleeding!” Kurt’s got a hand on his shoulder and the familiar face that Rory knows all too well that reeks of concerned father.     
 He swallows, wanting to say something, but catches himself just before the words “Dad, I’m fine.” slip past his lips.   
  “Maybe that’s how the others treat us around here, but we don’t do this to each other. We’re better than this.” Kurt’s words are final and he leads Rory off and when Rory does let a few tears slip (and pretends it’s because his whole body aches now, which it does), Blaine and Kurt put their hands on his shoulder and he finds there’s a lump in his throat he can’t get rid of for the rest of the afternoon. 

_________________________________    
   
When Santana comes up to Finn and him the next afternoon and starts in on them again, Rory tries to be the Hummel he’s been raised to be and stand up to her.     
  But before Rory can do anything, Finn is outing Santana in the middle of the McKinley High hallway.     
  Rory can’t place why he knows this is a defining moment in the entire universe, but he knows it even before she’s disappeared around the corner.      
________________________________   
   
 And he hates to admit it, but the I Can’t Go For That/You Make’ My Dreams Come True mash-up does sound awesome. It turns out that whatever he thinks of his parents’ musicality they actually must have known what they were talking about once upon a time.     
  When they were doing the choreography Mike mentions that he doesn’t understand how Blaine, Kurt and Rory all have the same odd little dance moves and Rory has a moment of panic because Mike knows.     
  “At least he doesn’t dance like Finn.” Kurt intones and Rory manages a weak chuckle, but finds himself feeling oddly proud in a way he never has before. So what if he dances like a dork, it’s because his family dances like dorks.    
_________________________________

  
 Blaine and Finn both sit next to each other at the debate and when Rory shows up they look at him surprised that as an exchange student he cares.     
“I want to support Kurt.” he says softly, making sure there’s an Irish lithe to his voice.     
  “Not Brittany?” Blaine asks and Rory shakes his head. He’s glad Blaine doesn’t press because he can’t explain why and it’ll kill him to lie.    
When Dad gets up to do his speech and he asks to ban dodgeball it all suddenly clicks in Rory’s head.   Kurt bans dodgeball because of him.     
  His dad bans dodgeball because of him.     
  If he wasn’t here his dad would never have asked to ban dodgeball but because he is here, his dad has asked to ban dodgeball.     
He can’t hide his pride and he stands up and claps, harder then Papa (who looks so in love with Dad at that moment that Rory can practically feel it filling the gym), harder than Grandpa (who he’s terrified to look at, because if anyone would know Rory across time and space, Grandpa Burt would be it), harder than anyone.     
He’s beginning to understand why he might be here now.    
  If only they knew why he was here too.   
  _(If they only knew he was here at all.)_


	4. Perfect

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kurt and Blaine's duet of Perfect from Rory's perspective.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during I Kissed A Girl.

Rory was truly going to try and lay low this week. After last week’s dodgeball fiasco, his main goal was not to draw any attention to himself. He’d almost called his dad — well his dad. He couldn’t let that happen again.

But then his dads’ had started singing their song and he found that he couldn’t keep his emotions to himself. 

He should have known what song it was the minute Papa mentioned that it was their car song (it will always be their car song. It was their car song in the way that meant that Rory could literally sing every word before he could form full coherent thoughts) but it still caught him by surprise. 

In retrospect, he blames being caught by surprise — pissed at Santana making a jab at Papa’s bow ties and hair gel. Why were they all so mean to each other in High School? It made no sense. They were like a family and all they did was insult one and other and just—-fight. 

Made a wrong turn once or twice  
Dad’s voice brings him back to the present (this present, not his, not where he wants to be) and his smile grows without being able to stop it. He tries biting his lip, but he can’t and soon he’s showing teeth. His head starts to bob to the music and he’s completely caught in the moment, sitting on the edge of his chair.

He looks around at everyone, still trying to seem cool and detached. Tina and Mike seem to be enjoying it though and so he lets his shoulders do a little Hummel signature shimmy. But that’s it. He swears. 

This song though is like coming home on a rainy day. It reminds him of car rides to Ohio from New York, pancakes for breakfasts and late nights watching Dad sketch his latest designs while Papa dances around shoeless. 

Unconsciously he starts to move his hands the same way they do because he’s sung this with them at the top of his lungs hundreds of thousands of times before. 

Rachel must have noticed because she turns around and looks right at him and for a minute he wants to say Hey, it’s not my fault. It’s our song. This is my family’s song, my Dads and me but instead he laughs it off and looks down, hoping that his face doesn’t have these are my Dads written all over it like he thinks it does. 

Because they are perfect to him and this was perfect and he might just make it through another week because they have this song, even here, the three of them.


	5. We Are You - So Let's Set This World on Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sugar seeks out Rory and Rory just wants to go home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Hold Onto Sixteen

“Aren’t you going to talk to me?” Sugar is standing in front of him, hands on hips, her tone the adopted valley girl she puts on when she wants attention. 

Rory sighs and looks around slowly to make sure he doesn’t see any New Directions members. They’re in a countdown to Sectionals and Sugar is basically the enemy. 

“What do you want Sugar Motta?” he asks making sure to put emphasis on her last name. 

“Firstly drop the Irish accent Rory Flanagan.” she huffs. He blinks, taken aback; he doesn’t even notice himself doing it any more. “Secondly aren’t you curious to hear my grand master plan?” 

Rory gives her a side eye. He didn’t even notice her at McKinley until the dodgeball incident and then she had given him a wink and it had all made sense. 

“I hate you Sugar.” he says. “And is Motta seriously the best you could come up with?” 

He doesn’t hate Sugar, he really doesn’t, it’s just she’s always been this strange girl that follows him around at “family” functions and talks about time travel and destiny and is way too much like her Mama than he cares for. And he has a sneaking suspicion that she’s part of the reason he’s in the past, trapped, unable to get home and stuck competing in his parents’ sectionals instead of his own. 

“Whatever, I’ve had this planned for ages.” she brags. “I found Al Motta, lonely bachelor and blackmailed him into—-“

Rory holds his hand up. “I don’t want to know.” he says, his New York accent finally showing through his fake Irish brogue. “I thought you ran away from home.” 

She tilts her head. “Duh, I ran away from home to the past.” she says. “What’s your excuse?” 

Rory doesn’t know his excuse; he just knows he wants to go home. “Your mama gave me a penny and then I somehow ended up here…” he mumbles. Sugar’s eyes light up and she claps her hands. 

“Mama is so smart!” she cheers. “I totally need a sidekick for my master plan and you’ll have to do in a —-” 

But what he’ll have to do in a pinch he’ll never know because Dad comes whirling around the corner and his eyes lock on the two of them. “Rory!” he calls out as Rory jumps away from Sugar, trying to look innocent and from Ireland and not from New York two decades from now standing with Sugar Pierce-Lopez.  
“Choir room in 3 minutes, emergency Sectionals meeting, chop chop!” he lays a hand on Rory’s shoulder and steers him away from Sugar who waves far too sweetly after them for Rory’s liking.   
__________________________________________________

The emergency meeting turns out to be the return of one Sam Evans, who Rory only knows as the guy who brings the wicked guitar to all the New Direction parties and plays country and taught Rory how to play beer pong in secret one time.

“That’s Sam Evans.” Kurt whispers helpfully and Rory smiles, not because Kurt’s trying to help him fit in but because Kurt and Blaine have suddenly seemed to take a shine to him and have been actively including him in conversation. 

Sam whips a guitar out of nowhere (one of his best talent, Rory thinks) and as Mr. Schue passes around his endless supply of Sparkling Cider in Red Cup, he declares he’s going to country-up the place. 

Red Solo Cup is one of Rory’s all time guilty pleasures. He doesn’t remember when he first heard it but he knows all the lyrics and if Dad ever caught him singing —- well he’d look pretty much like he’s looking right now at Papa who seems to be enjoying himself far more than Rory’d ever expected. 

And for a minute everything is fun and light and nice in the choir room and Rory thinks that maybe if things stay like this he’ll suddenly, magically get to go home. Sam even seems to mellow of Santana who seems to smell out people to insult like some sort of blood thirsty insult shark.   
__________________________________________________

Considering it’s Sectionals and New Directions (per usual) has barely gotten their selection together, Rory thinks things are going pretty well. He apparently has no idea what he’s talking about though because their dance practice falls apart almost before it’s really begun. 

It starts innocently enough. All he and Puck are trying to say is when the girls dance people pay attention and then Papa suggests that they try some dance move and then Sam suggests some hip swivel thing (that Rory can’t even do) and then suddenly Papa is yelling and shoving and Rory is just absolutely flummoxed. 

“No one go after him.” Kurt says as Blaine storms of the room, look pained and freaked out all at once. “He just—-it’ll be alright.” 

Finn of course doesn’t listen and Rory prays that this is the bomb that ends the cold war. Because he can’t take much more of this.  
_____________________________________________________ 

Whatever happens between Blaine and Finn does end the war because they’re suddenly the best of buds that makes Rory’s heart squeeze tight as he thinks of home. Sectionals itself passes for him in a blur of Michael Jackson and complicated dance moves and all he remembers is Sugar looking right at him as if to say be proud of me, I’m about to win and get everything I wanted and then the look of sheer horror and defeat on her face when New Directions wins and Troubletones don’t. 

He’s actually scared that she might disappear after they lose, but when she shows up with Mercedes, Britney and Santana in the auditorium he half expects that she’s here to take him home. 

He’s so happy in that minute that he hugs Britney and welcomes her back into the fold, feeling home so close that he can taste it. The love in the room, the togetherness feels exactly like it should and he knows it’s time to go. 

But the song ends and he’s still there, wrapped in the group hug. He looks across the circle at Sugar and mouths, hoping only she’ll see. 

Home?

And she smiles her wicked little smile at him and mouths back two simple words. 

Not yet.


	6. Do They Know It's Christmas Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's something about Itchy the Holiday Elf.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Extraordinary Merry Christmas

Mercedes tells Santana, who tells Brittney — who tells Rory as she’s brushing out Lord Tubbington’s fur — that apparently Sugar has gone on vacation somewhere fabulous for Christmas.

 

Rory is instantly bitter because he knows she’s gone back to the future and he’s furious and then panicked and then just overwhelmed because she’s gone home and he, well, he’s stuck here.

 

He wants to know how she did it. How she knew to warn them she was leaving and if she has gone back why didn’t she take him and he’s kicking himself, why didn’t he keep a closer eye on her.

 

When Finn asks him what’s wrong he lies and tells him that his mother has called and said she can’t fly in for the holidays. He’s not lying exactly either. He’s got no family coming for Christmas, being that they’re all in the future and he’s stuck here, possibly forever.

 

Finn had invited him to the holidays with the Hudmels but Rory had turned him down because the idea of sitting with his family when they’re not his family, well you might as well kill him because it’ll hurt less.

  
“It’s really no problem.” Finn says. “It’s actually kinda cool. Kurt and my mom make too much to eat and we’ll probably have Rachel and Blaine over at some point and we all just hang out and watch really old Christmas specials on TV—-“

 

Rory can’t tell him that he knows all this already and that those traditions will never change. Instead he just shakes his head. “No, really it’s fine.” ****

He knows that while he can trust himself to remember to say Kurt, Finn, Mr. Hummel and Ms. Hudson when he’s at school that the second he’s full of turkey and sweet potatoes, he’ll be a goner. He’ll call them Dad or Grandmum or end up sounding insane as he tries to explain how he knows that they make two pies because Finn’s going to eat the first one before dinner’s even in the oven. He can’t do that to himself. 

 

“Well, still , if you’re sad you should just sing it out.” Finn suggests.   Rory looks at Finn and nods slowly. They really did think that singing fixed everything back then, didn’t they?

 

“I think I will, thanks Finn Hudson.” he says softly, not quite meeting Finn’s eye. He can only think of one song that fits his mood, his Christmas this year is going to be very blue indeed.

______________________

 

This time he’s not afraid to look right at Dad and Papa when he sings. He can’t imagine a holiday without them.

 

They thrive in the pageantry and merriment and he hopes that time stands still in the future because he can’t bear the idea of them spending a Christmas not as a family.

 

Blaine’s eyes are always proud and shining, there’s always something guarded in Kurt’s eye and he doesn’t want his dad to ever look at him like that. 

 

He knows that Dad had trust issues and walls a hundred miles high before he met Papa and he supposes that Papa hasn’t had time to knock all those walls down yet. But he wants to help break those walls down too, because if his Dad is hurting, Rory’s hurting too.

 

Sam ends up being the one that saves him from spending Christmas alone.

 

He says yes before he realizes that this is tale Sam tells about spending a  _Very Irish Christmas Eve_  in high school and he takes pause to compartmentalize the fact that he’s becoming part of everyone’s history.

 

He’s become part of his own history really and he just can’t think about that right now. Instead he’ll focus on being the Rory Flanagan that Sam has so many fond memories of.

 

Sam who’s never around but always there when Rory has needed him. Who spends half his life with a guitar playing everywhere and anywhere, who teaches Rory about nerdy things, God, beer pong and how to be cool around the ladies. 

 

Of course he wants to be Rory’s Christmas sponsor, because that’s just Sam.  It’s Sam in 2011 as much as it’s Sam in 2034.  It’s how he fits into everyone’s life. Into Rory’s life, past, present or future.

  __________________________

 

Artie on the other hand has become drunk on power and gone insane. Or possibly is seeing visions from the future, but Rory’s too afraid to ask. 

 

“…in the perfectly appointed living room of Kurt Hummel and Blaine Anderson’s chic and swank chalet…” 

 

Rory, who honestly hadn’t been paying much attention at this point, so wrapped up in his Christmas gloom, tilts his head and gives his full attention. 

_But how does he know._

 

“…the tree towering and opulent, the fireplace draped in garlands, the stockings bejewelled…” 

Rory can’t help but nod because it’s—-well it’s exactly Christmas — he can see it in front of him, the 10 foot tall Douglas Fir that Uncle Finn cuts himself. The stocking for all the kids…everything is just—it’s right there, so close but still painfully far. 

 

“…Kurt and Blaine, the perfect hosts, have invited their friends to drop in…” 

 

No. Artie must know. He must on some level be having some sort of future deja vu because he’s literally describing 15 years of Christmases to Rory, right here in the April Rhodes auditorium.  

 

“Are you telling me I’m not invited to Kurt and Blaine’s for Christmas?” Rachel asks in alarm and Rory has to look down before his smile cracks his face, he’s laughing so hard at the thought of Rachel missing a Christmas at the Hummel-Andersons and it’s just—-impossible. She’s literally commandeered a private helicopter to make it to the New Directions party on time (it was all very dramatic, her landing on the front yard, destroying topiary and brushing off Dad’s sarcastic remarks about sled dogs with a  _but that’s animal abuse Kurt_ ). 

 

“The evening concludes with Rory dressed as the Christmas Elf Itchy, reading from Frosty the Snowman.” Artie finishes with flourish and Rory wonders if Artie knows about the time when he was five and ran around in his Elf suit from December 24th to January 2nd —- but that’s impossible because that’s still almost a decade from now. 

 

Sam’s not having any of Artie’s sugarplum vision. He grandstands about feeling more than just happiness around Christmas and things that don’t remind Rory of home at all. He might be blue right now but Christmas is about cheer and decorations and traditions.

 

And when he tells Rory to come, Rory just—he can’t. He wants to stay here. Artie’s vision feels like Christmas at home.

 

And all Rory wants these days is home. **  
**

____________________________________

 

Papa and Rachel come up with Extraordinary Merry Christmas the next day. Rory’s always wondered where it came from and he can’t help but smile in wonderment at the fact that he’s now witnessed the very first performance.   20 years from now, that song will have been performed on over 50 stages over 100 times, including once at the Macy’s Thanksgivings Parade when Rory was 8.

 

He’s seen in preformed with backup singers, children’s choirs, lights and fancy costumes, but preformed in the choir room with nothing there but a backing band, well Rory likes this version best. 

______________________________________

 

Rory’s also seen the Glee Holiday Spectacular every Christmas Eve in Ohio on Grandpa Burt’s ancient PVR recorder, but it never gets old, especially getting to see it live. He doesn’t remember Itchy the Elf, but he’s also never made it all the way to the end before. Dad always turns it off after Brittney’s song because—-because there’s an elf that reads a bible verse.   And then Rory realizes for the second time that week that he’s become part of his own past.  _He’s the elf._

 

He reads the passage. He changes the script. He finds a bible on set and flips through to the birth of Christ. He knows nothing of the bible, but there’s a passage that Linus reads to Charlie Brown in that special and he knows that. 

 

He finds it and skims it and then realizes that Christmas is really what Sam was talking about. Rory’s heart aches because he misses his Christmases and now that he’s having another Christmas his old Christmases mean so much more. It’s about love and peace and good will towards men. 

 

He reads the passage out loud and vows to himself that he’ll watch the special all the way through when he gets home.

________________________________________

 

Sam and he stand on the street corner and Rory finds himself telling him tall tales about brothers and bells (poor Seamus who will never exist) and joking about Valentine’s sponsors and he finds the ache to go home lessening just a little.

 

If he’s stuck here, at least he has people who love him around. They may not know why, but they still do. 

 

It’ll have to be his Christmas miracle for now.


	7. 28 Things You Didn’t Know About Rory Flanagan

1\. His name is actually Rory Dalton Hummel-Anderson.

2\. He’s only been called his full name once when he nearly stepped out into traffic in Times Square.

3\. He doesn’t have a brother called Seamus.

4\. He does however have an older brother, Noel who goes by Toronto (but no one remembers why, he just always has).

5\. He also has a younger sister, Katherine Elizabeth, who was nearly named Pippa but everyone agreed that Pippa Elizabeth Hummel-Anderson sounded ridiculous. She prefers to be called Katy.

6\. Seamus is actually an old sheep dog who Papa found and named all while Dad was away in Milan during fashion week before they had kids. Dad learned from the experience never to go anywhere alone ever again.

7\. Rory once caught Kurt staying up all night when the dog was violently ill, so he knows that his dad loves the dog despite the fact that he denies it all the time and calls Seamus “Blaine’s Dog”.

8\. Seamus sheds and has gotten lost in Central Park over a dozen times.

9\. Only 4 times has it not been Finn’s fault. 

10\. Rory was named such because he was “conceived” during a trip to Ireland.

11\. Rory is actually named Rory because while Kurt was trampling around the country side being inspired by Nature, Blaine became obsessed with Doctor Who.

12\. All three siblings were born from a surrogate that Kurt and Blaine found through an agency. When asked about the matter, Kurt will only say “Rachel, let it go. I was never going to let you mother my children.”

13\. Noel, Rory and Katy knew all the words to Perfect by the time they were 3. Katy also surprised everyone by knowing the entire score to Evita and Wicked before she entered kindergarten. (Kurt wasn’t surprised considering all the hours he’d sung her to sleep to the soundtracks)

14\. Rory was alone with Grandpa Burt the second time his heart gave out. He doesn’t remember calling 911 or how they got to the hospital, but he does remember Dad crying and Uncle Finn praying and he’s so glad that it all turned out okay in the end because a world without Grandpa doesn’t make any sense.

15\. All three kids don’t have Godparents. Dad says its for two reasons. Firstly he doesn’t believe in God and secondly while he occasionally doesn’t mind bloodsport, he really didn’t relish the thought of the cat fight between Rachel, Mercedes and Mike that threatened to break out when the topic was brought up.

16\. Finn spent over 2 weeks moping because he had assumed that Kurt and Blaine would have named him automatically.

17\. Rory is closer to Uncle Finn than practically anyone in the whole world. He thinks that people don’t give him enough credit.

18\. Rory has modelled for Hummable Designs for over 12 seasons. His favourite pieces are the simple ones.

19\. Rory’s favourite colour is actually red, but he happened to be wearing green the day he landed at McKinley and it just sort of—-worked.

20\. Sam Evans taught Rory, Sugar, Noel and Matt how to play beer pong at 3am at Matt’s sweet 16 in Nashville. Mercedes, Kurt and Santana have no idea. The only other witnesses were Artie and Puck.

21\. Kurt and Blaine do have a Christmas Chalet, but it’s in Vermont. Blaine contemplated momentarily the Swiss Alps, but getting 3 kids and a large dog there every year would have been a nightmare, not to mention all of New Directions.

22\. Rory’s favourite holiday tradition is Uncle Finn passing out from eating too much pie before the whole family gathers to watch the Glee Holiday Spectacular.

23\. The core members of New Directions get together at least twice a year, somewhere between Christmas and New Years at the Hummel-Anderson chalet and on Labour Day for Artie’s White Party in the Hamptons.

24\. Rory is the exact opposite of his siblings. While Noel and Katy look like Andersons but act like Hummels. Rory looks like a Hummel but acts like an Anderson.

25\. Grandma says that Rory acts like a Hudson and always makes sure to give him extra love when he’s feeling low.

26\. She also always gives him the biggest slice of pie at Christmas.

27\. Rory suffers occasionally from middle child syndrome. He’s not nearly as loud as his siblings, nor as   
dramatic and sometimes he feels lost in the shuffle. He always wants more time alone with just his dads and him.

28\. He misses his siblings like crazy, but he’s secretly glad it’s just him (and Sugar) who are in the past because he finally gets his dads all to himself.


	8. The Proposal (part 1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rory finds it increasingly difficult to remember that Kurt and Blaine are his parents and not his friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Yes/No

Rory realizes, lying in bed after Mr. Schuester proposes to Ms. Pillsbury, his skin still smelling faintly of chlorine, that he very possibly has screwed everything up. 

He blames his parents’ lack of ever showing him the seminal time-travelling classic Back to the Future. 

“You’re getting too close to them.” Sugar had warned, lounging beside him in the empty choir room the day before Christmas break. 

“How can you get too close to your own parents?” Rory asks her. His New York accent is starting to sound strange and foreign even to his own ears and somewhere in the back of his mind he knows that’s not a good thing. 

“I don’t know but I am too.” Sugar says, for once in her life not sounding cocky and self assured. 

Rory thinks for a minute then turns to her. “Then we don’t worry about it.” 

“We can’t be their friends Rory. We’re their kids.” she says sounding just a little sad. 

Even with Sugar’s warning, the change from son to friend happens anyways. He goes over to play video games with Finn over winter break and Kurt had come down with a box of old clothes to put in the basement because they were out of season and he’d asked to see the clothes because he missed dressing like he was raised to. 

It had been a literal treasure trove, full of well tailored jeans, silky vests and proper shoes. He’d asked to borrow a few pieces, running his fingers over a plain grey vest, feeling the weight and stitch and Kurt got this funny look on his face and told him he could borrow whatever he liked and would he like to take a look at his closet as well.  
Kurt had taken him shopping and then Blaine had started including Rory in their conversations and one morning they suddenly weren’t Dad and Papa but Kurt and Blaine. 

Blaine teases him about wanting a girlfriend and Rory takes his teasing as a friend. 

He helps them all plan Mr. Schue’s proposal even though he knows she’ll already say yes. 

He laughs as everyone looks on in surprise as Kurt hits the water like he was born a fish. 

He jokes with the boys in the locker room afterwards about how all their proposals will have to somehow top Mr. Schue’s and then Puck looks at Kurt and Blaine curiously and says. 

“When it’s two dudes, who proposes?” 

“Blaine,” Rory answers without thinking, “but Kurt bought the ring first, the receipt is framed to prove it.” 

Everyone’s eyes fall on him and he flushes bright, bright red, realizing what he’s said. 

Kurt’s eyelids are fluttering rapidly in shock and Blaine’s got this half bemused, half totally confused look on his face and his eyes are wide. 

“I mean I would assume.” Rory mumbles, looking down. 

“A framed receipt?” Blaine repeats. “Why would you frame the receipt?” he asks Kurt. 

Kurt gives him a withering look. “I don’t know, ask Rory.” he says. 

“It’s just a stupid—-it was stupid!” Rory stammers. 

It’s not stupid. It’s literally the sweetest story Rory knows. 

Kurt had bought a ring and was waiting for the perfect moment. Blaine had too, from Tiffany’s and was trying to find the right words, struggling for weeks on end when Kurt accidentally found it next to the spare tubs of hair gel. He’d taken it and tried it on (just because it was so beautiful and he had to) and then it wouldn’t come off so he spent the whole evening hiding his left hand until Jeopardy, when he’d suddenly been seized with inspiration and looks right at Blaine and said Yes I will. 

Blaine had looked so confused until Kurt had clarified the statement as The question is will I marry you and they had laughed and cried and Kurt had admitted that the ring wouldn’t come off and that it was perfect because Kurt never wanted to take it off ever. 

Blaine had gotten down on one knee anyways and proposed properly, and then allowed Kurt to run to the bedroom (where he’d been hiding Blaine’s ring in his hope chest) and Kurt got the ring and proposed to Blaine because they were that sort of couple.

When everyone asks, they always say Blaine proposed. But Kurt frames the receipt, joking that while he might always be ready for the next step with Blaine first, Blaine always manages to make the first move.

Kurt stares at him long after they’ve left the shower room. They’re nearly at their respective rides home when he finally says something. “A framed receipt.” he says. “It has a certain dramatic flair to it.” Rory nods slowly. 

“You’re an odd duck Rory.” he says, hopping into the front of his Navigator. “By the way, I like the outfit.” he adds, appraising Rory’s look. 

“Thanks.” Rory mumbles. 

“Hey, if you have any more fantastic stories of our future don’t forget to share!” Blaine teases, getting into the passenger’s side. “Framed receipt, I can totally picture it.”

He manages a half grin, but the thought plagues him all the way home with Brittney and Santana and stays with him as he begs off early, claiming fatigue. 

What if he messes it up? What if when he gets home there is no receipt on the living room mantle. 

He feels the weight of knowing that he has the ability to affect his future, affect his parents’ future. 

And it feels like a terrible weight to bear.


	9. The Proposal (part 2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Blaine tells Rory about a certain ring.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reaction to the Box Scene

"I gave Kurt a ring. At Christmas. He thought I was proposing and that’s both terrifying and awesome because I would marry him but we’re so young and how do I know we’re going to want to be together forever”

 

Rory’s not sure why Blaine’s telling him this. He’d sat down beside him, still dripping wet from Mr. Schuester’s proposal in the pool. There had been no segue, no explanation or reason for him to announce this, completely out of the blue. 

 

They’re not alone. All around them the glee guys are changing out of damp suits. Blaine looks down, combing gel back into his hair, as if he regrets saying it out loud. 

 

“Were you proposing?” 

 

“No…” the second declaration is quieter, “yes. We’re not ready for marriage yet. We can’t even get married yet if we wanted to.” Blaine looks up, eyes skirting first to Kurt and then back to Rory, “It was a promise ring.” 

 

Rory breaths a sigh of relief. It’s not that he thinks the proposal would be wrong it’s just—-there’s a better proposal coming. 

 

Blaine looks towards him. “Should it have been an engagement ring?” 

 

Rory looks at him with a shrug. “If you wanted it to be.” he looks over at Kurt. “I think—I think you’d be good married.” 

 

The beaming smile Blaine gives him in return is worth more than Rory could ever tell him. “Thanks Rory.” 

 

Puck sits down beside them, heavily enough to shake the bench a little. “When it’s two dudes, who proposes?” he wonders aloud. 

 

And there it is, the image of Blaine’s real proposal as fresh in his mind as any story told to him a thousand times. 


	10. Mantra

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Papa will be okay becomes his mantra. Ingrained in every event, every step, every thought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Michael

He finds the note slipped into his locker.

_Rory -  
Gone back to the future, be back soon.  
xoxo  
Sugar  
ps. Sorry I couldn’t take you, still working on that. _

He’s pretty bummed about that. Going home is beginning to feel like the prize that will never come, and somehow it haunts him less and less.

He tries not to dwell on her absence and instead focuses on Regionals talk. Everyone is all Michael Jackson all the time, no one louder or more excited than Blaine. So much so that he lets it slip to the Warblers and the Warblers throw it back in their faces and take it from them.

It’s odd hearing everyone talk smack about Dalton. He’s been to dinner with Trent, Nick, Jeff, Wes and David more times than he can count. His parents still hold the building dear to their hearts; their vow renewal had been on the very steps where they’d met.

So when Blaine suggests the sing-off he can’t see the harm. Even he’s seen Bad and the whole thing feels thrilling and illegal. Blaine lends him a leather jacket and the adrenaline pumps through his veins a mile a minute.

Until the slushy.

It happens so quickly that he almost misses it. Sebastian launches forward aiming a Big Gulp at Kurt and then Blaine is in front of him and then on the ground screaming.

Rory’s entire body freezes, his eyes wide and a cold ice flooding his veins. He hears the Warblers fleeing the scene and his stomach gives a painful lurch.

“It’s okay; it’s going to be okay.” Kurt keeps saying, looking like he’s watched someone shot in front of him. His eyes are wide, the whites startling, his hands are trembling a little as he holds Blaine closer, trying to sooth him. Rory doesn’t know how he looks right now, but he imagines that it’s a mirror image of Kurt.

“Come on.” Santana says, taking charge suddenly as the scene begins to speed up again, the life thrumming back into the garage. “We’ll get you to the hospital Blaine, it’ll be okay.”

“I can’t see!” Blaine sobs and Rory feels his heart leap into his throat. He doesn’t know what happens next, who gets him into a car, because his father is hurt and his heart feels like it’s been pulled straight from his chest still beating.

He only remembers the later, after everyone but Kurt and Finn leave the hospital and he’s pressing his head against the cool seat of the guest bathroom in the Pierce house releasing all his fear and anguish.

“Rory?” Brittany’s voice is soft as she hovers in the doorway. “Are you okay? Blaine’ll be okay.”

He covers his mouth to hide his sob because he knows that, because he’s been there, he’s from the future, he knows that Papa can’t be that hurt but all he can see, all he can hear, is Blaine on the ground screaming and crying, curled into himself in pain. His mind keeps playing cruel tricks, imagining his Papa in New York, the look of horror that would cover Katy’s face, the panic that would radiate off Noel. And Dad, poor Dad reliving the same moment in time over and over again.

Brittany wraps him in a hug from behind and rocks him gently and he can’t remember when he falls asleep in her arms, but he does.

When he wakes the next morning, he lies in bed staring at the ceiling repeating to himself that Papa will be okay, Papa will be okay. He’s from the future and he knows that Papa will be okay.

He must have said it over 1000 times by the time Kurt enters the choir room.

Dad looks exactly like Rory expects him too, exhausted and drawn, like he’s hurting right alongside Blaine.

Even when he’s telling them that Blaine needs surgery, Rory just keeps repeating the phrase over and over again.

He’s repeating it so loudly to himself that he barely hears Artie’s outburst. He feels like if he stops saying it, that it’ll stop being true.

All rehearsal he keeps looking at Kurt and as Schue releases them for the day, he knows what he has to do. He reaches out to touch Dad’s shoulder as he passes.

“He’ll be okay Kurt.” Rory says when Kurt turns to look at him, his eyes a clear blue that radiates the pain he’s feeling. Rory doesn’t care if he’s remembered his Irish accent or if Kurt thinks it’s strange because he needs to say this, for both of them.

Kurt nods his lips in a tight, thin line, bright against how pale his face is.

“No I mean it.” Rory says. “I—-he’ll, I know he’ll be fine.” Papa will be okay.

“Thank you Rory.” Kurt says softly, pulling away, a small smile on his face. “I’m sure he will be.” he pats Rory’s shoulder in return, his eyes warming, the colour returning to his cheeks just a little bit, and Rory feels a swell of pride that he helped just a little bit.

His whole week afterwards feels punctured by the mantra. Superstitious or not, he feels like if he keeps saying it then it’ll have to be true. Every event, every action, every thought attaches itself to the words, ingrained in his memory. Quinn gets into Yale. Papa will be okay. Kurt gets into NYADA. Papa will be okay. Santana gets Sebastian to confess to slushy being full of rock salt. Papa will be okay. They show the Warblers what it really means to be a team and give up MJ for Regionals. Papa will be okay.

Sugar returns promptly the following Monday, reappearing as if she’d never been gone at all. Everyone fills her in and she does her best to act surprised and awed by the tidal wave of news that greets her. But the first chance she gets she drags Rory out to the bleachers.

“Artie’s not my dad.” she says breathlessly. “I went back — to see what was happening.”

“What about—-” Rory starts.

“Your dad still has two eyes.” Sugar says, rolling both of her own. “Rory, don’t you get it, we are the past, and nothing is going to change.”

He looks at her, not believing a word. “You can’t promise that Sugar, so don’t.” he says. He studies her for a minute and then leans closer. Losing her as an ally, as a friend won’t help him at all. “So what about Artie?”

“He’s not my dad,” Sugar says. “Some other guy is.” she says. “His name is Sebastian Smythe.”

Rory’s blood goes cold. “Sebastian?” he says softly. “Are you sure?”

Sugar nods. “Yeah but that’s great because now I can go out with Artie, and he likes me, so yay!”

“Sugar!” Rory barks, trying to get her attention back. “Are you sure?”  
She tilts her head. “I found my birth certificate.” she says. “I’m sure, why?”

“Because he’s evil!” Rory explodes. “Why would your mom even go near him! He hurt my Papa and he tried to hurt my Dad and he’s a smirky dumb little chipmunk meerkat.” He slams his fist down on the bleachers. When he pulls his hand back his knuckles are raw and red. The pain feels good.

“I didn’t know.” Sugar says softly. “I’m—-I’m sorry Rory.” she says softly. “Maybe it’s just a big misunderstanding.”

“Maybe.” Rory says. He leans back on the bleachers and looks up at the dying afternoon sun. Papa will be okay. “Maybe.”

Papa will be okay.

But he doubts it.


	11. One Of Those Weeks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rory is having one of those weeks. And he hopes that he never has another one again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during The Spanish Teacher

Rory knows Monday that it’s going to be one of those weeks. This type of hell week happens to be unique to people displaced in their parents past. He decides that if he never has one of those weeks ever again, it will in fact be a lifetime too soon.

It starts when Coach Sylvester announces that she’d like the boys of New Directions to shoot into a cup for her to make a baby. Rory wonders for all of 5 seconds if he should tell her he can’t on account of the fact that he’s actually from the future himself but before he can say anything, Coach Sylvester tells Dad that the weirdness should end with him and he is literally, completely, utterly offended.

“She shouldn’t have said that,” he tells Kurt as Schue hulls the Coach from the room.

“It’s nothing,” Kurt says, brushing it off. “That’s just how Coach Sylvester is. Bold, unhinged and inappropriate.”

“No, but you should have children,” Rory says before he can stop himself. “3—-” he pauses. “Or you know, however many you want.”

Kurt smiles. “I’m glad you think so,” he says. “It’s very progressive of you. I’ve always fancied adoption personally.”  
“NO!” Rory says. “I mean—-you don’t want to pass on your genetics?”

Kurt cocks his head to the side. “I’ve never thought about it,” he says. “I suppose letting such flawless skin and exquisite talent go to waste would be a tragedy.”

“You should think about it,” Rory adds. “A lot.” He blushes furiously realizing what he’s said. “I should—-washroom.” He practically, and rather lamely he thinks later, flees the room, feeling the heat of Kurt’s confused stare follow his exit.

The week doesn’t get any better from there. Firstly, Schuester literally gets every fact about 2030 wrong. Rory should know, seeing as he’s lived through it already. 

He exchanges quick glances with Sugar the whole time as she pulls faces and rolls her eyes as he postulates about how everyone will speak Spanish.

When he introduces Mr. Martinez, Rory watches as Kurt’s eyes get wide and his breath speed up a bit. He realizes in absolute horror that Dad is crushing on this dude. He wants to run over and shake Kurt and scream PAPA! REMEMBER HE TOOK A SLUSHY FOR YOU, STOP DROOLING.

Instead, he dances to the dorky song that plays at every wedding, bar mitzvah and group social event in 2035 and tries not to die laughing at how ridiculous everyone looks.

When the song finishes, he slides his chair over to Kurt, who’s excitedly whispering to the girls about how hot Martinez.

“You should tell Blaine,” he says abruptly as soon as he can get a word in edgewise.

Everyone turns to stare at him and Sugar leans over, threatening Rory with her patented bitch stare.

Kurt looks at him like he’s absolutely lost it.

“I think he would have enjoyed it,” Rory says quickly. “You know because—-uh—reasons.” he stammers and Sugar reaches around his back and pinches Rory hard on his waist.

“He probably would.” Kurt says slowly and a wicked smile grows across his face. “I should show him, shouldn’t I.”

“Kurt you’re terrible!” Rachel shriek-giggles.

“I am,” Kurt agrees, and Rory can practically see the wheels turning in his head. 

He sits beside Kurt again while Mercedes sings to Sam. Rory wants so badly to tell them that it will work, and then it won’t, but they’ll always have each other but he keeps silent. He’s probably shifted the time space continuum enough suggesting the whole biological children thing to Kurt. With his luck, he’ll come home to 6 siblings or none at all.

“So I took your suggestion,” Kurt whispers to him suddenly. “I told Blaine about the performance.” he’s smiling that same self-satisfied smirk.

“Oh?” Rory whispers back. “And, uh, did he, like it?”

He shudders a little internally at the realization that he’s basically inquiring after his parents’ sex life. 

“Oh yes,” Kurt says. “Thanks Rory.”

“Don’t mention it,” Rory mumbles, blushing so red, he can probably be seen from space.

Kurt must really have liked his suggestion because he’s being even friendlier than usual to Rory now, but all Rory can think about is that his parents probably had sex at his suggestion. Can Blaine even have sex while recovering? Is it pirate themed? Rory tries not to gag with the fact that he’s even thinking these kinds of things. 

Kurt decides that he’ll personally get Rory ready for Sam’s latin number, helping him with his bolero tie and those weird shoes that everyone trips over before Kurt shows them how to put them on.

“You look very dashing,” Kurt says. “You wear colour very well Rory.” he compliments.

“Thank you,” Rory blushes and tries not to get choked up.

“You should wear more colours than just red and green,” Kurt tells him. “Let me take you shopping again this weekend.” he asks.

“I’d love that,” Rory says. At home, he thinks, guilt roiling in his stomach, he would have said no, but here he can’t think of anything he’d rather do. “You have a great eye for fashion, Kurt,” he tells him. “You should maybe open up your own line some day.”

Kurt laughs, light and airy. “The lights on Broadway shine too brightly for me.” he tells him. “But I have to admit, it’s quite the thought. Anyways Kurt Hummel just doesn’t have the same ring as Tom Ford or Marc Jacobs.” 

“Hummable Designs does though,” Rory mumbles and he claps his hands over his mouth, cursing the fact that around Kurt it’s like he has no filter.

“What was that?” Kurt asks, having turned away to adjust his own outfit.

“Nothing,” Rory says quickly. “Thanks for the advice.”

He nearly makes it to the end of the week without further incident, save for an embarrassing episode in the locker room where he has to pretend that he doesn’t wash down there (which is nearly as shudder inducing as knowing his parents had sex at his suggestion). In fact, for one of those weeks, things could have been a lot worse.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Sugar rounds on him, just as he’s about to escape the school for the weekend.

“Excuse me?”

“This whole week, don’t think I haven’t heard you,” Sugar says. “Are you trying to fuck everything up?” she looks furious, eyes flashing.

“I don’t—” he starts, but she cuts him off, poking him hard in the chest.

“Don’t tell them things about the future. We’re here to help in the background Rory, to make sure that things happen that are supposed to happen.”

“I didn’t do anything,” Rory protests, getting angry back.

“Stop being friends with Kurt,” she says. “I know you’re homesick and I’m sorry Rory, but you can’t.”

He thinks about hitting her for a second, but doesn’t.

“Come on, I’ll buy you like an ice cream or something,” Sugar says. “You could be my friend Rory.”

“I am your friend,” Rory reminds her. “If I wasn’t I probably wouldn’t be stuck here in the first place.”

“I mean here too,” she says, then adds, “I’ll get you home soon, really, I will.”

“Thanks,” he says softly, meaning it with every fibre of his being, because he honestly can’t have another one of those weeks ever again.


	12. Just Another Love Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Love permeates the air around McKinley like a thick smog the week leading up to Valentines. It gets into every thought, every action of everyone. No one is immune from Cupid’s bow it seems. At least that’s how Rory feels when he wakes up one morning and finds himself accidentally and completely falling for one Sugar Lopez-Pierce.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Heart

Sometimes, when Dad’s working too hard (like that time he hosted a Cabaret in SoHo while trying to prep his clothing line launch at Macy’s), Papa forces him to take a break by turning on Love Shack by The B-52s.

 

Rory’s never understood why, but while at first Kurt will resist, eventually his shoulder start to shimmy in time to the music and by the time the girl’s screaming tin roof rusted, he’s singing right along and then he’ll fall into Blaine’s waiting arms and laughs solidly for a good five minutes.

 

Valentine’s Day 2012, Rory finally understands why this ritual never fails to work. Love is permeates the air around McKinley like a thick smog the week leading up to Valentines. It gets into every thought, every action of everyone. No one is immune from Cupid’s bow it seems. At least that’s how Rory feels when he wakes up one morning and finds himself accidentally and completely falling for one Sugar Lopez-Pierce.

He doesn’t mean to at first, but the feelings sneak up on him almost overnight and her overdramatic love of spending her sugar daddy’s money (what she has on him to get him to fund her like this, he’ll never know. Nor does he really want to, come to think of it.) has become appealing in its own odd way.

He’s been thinking about asking her on a date all week and her weird fascination with Valentine’s seems like the perfect opportunity.

 

He catches her after Glee. “Sugar I was wondering if—”

 

“Not now,” she’s already pulled her phone out and is busy making furious notes. “This is my parent’s first valentines as a couple Rory, you don’t understand, everything must be perfect.”

 

“I know I thought—”

 

“Talk to me later, m’kay?” she kisses him quickly on the cheek and flounces off to do God knows what.

 

He touches the spot where her lipstick leaves a bright pink stain and grins. It may be her parents first Valentine’s, but Rory is determined to make it theirs too. 

 

“Rory!” Tina calls to him as she and Mike walk hand and hand towards the cafeteria.

 

“Come on,” he grins and follows them dutifully, grabbing his own tray of food and joining the rest of New Directions at their table. Puck is mid-tale about the Lima University sorority he seems to be doing all at the same time and Dad is on cloud nine over the sheer volume of gifts that Papa’s apparently been sending from his sickbed.

 

(Not actually sick, Kurt had explained the moment Rory had inquired, simply under strict orders to rest his eye another week before subjecting it to the harsh lighting provided by the Lima Public School System)  
  
He’s about to declare his own affections when Artie railroads him and announces his intentions to take Sugar to her Valentine’s event.

 

It takes everything Rory has to stay in character, to not stand up and scream at Artie that two weeks ago Sugar was under the impression that Artie was his father. Instead he pulls the dumb four leaf clover that Sugar gave him as a joke the other day (to remind you that you’re a Flanagan, she had play scolded when he’d gotten too close to Kurt again, raiding his closet for clothes) and holds it out.

 

“You’ll need all the luck you can get.” He had grown up around Sugar. If anyone should have her in this time, it should be him. He’s seeing so much red that he barely even hears Kurt address him. His mind is filled with a sudden urge to claim Sugar, to tell everyone he meets that they’re an item.

 

If this is love, Rory’s not so sure he wants it.

 

It consumes him, something akin to being lit on fire. He needs to beat Artie. He needs to prove that he knows her better. Artie gets her a candy heart, Rory gets her a bag filled to bursting with so many of the sugary monstrosities she could build a castle.

 

That’s not to say that Artie doesn’t have his own plans. Rory’s Be Mine pillow is covered in confetti and abandon in a trash can. He has to admit, there really is little competing with hearts falling from the sky.

 

And then he has it. An idea so terrible, so corny, so  _Anderson_  in nature that it just might work. He calls it Operation Seamus and within a few hours has sourced the perfect candidate.

 

He follows Artie into the library, watching as he hands Sugar the stupid stuffed dog in the fake carrier. His present sniffs and whines in its box but he knows he’s got Artie beat.

 

After all, what tops a terrier? He remembers her staring at a passel of them in a window once, on one of their many forced outings with their parents. She couldn’t have been more than 9 or 10, but she had cried like a baby when Santana had told her no.

 

“You should name it Marty,” He watches Artie wheel away out of the corner of his eye and leans in further to talk to her.

 

“Zeke,” she corrects. “But why Marty.”

 

“After the guy in Back to the Future,” he spent the whole weekend previously watching it. He’s decided to try and make his own way home now. He might have Sugar here, but he’d replace her in a heartbeat for home and his own bed and his parents and the faint sounds of New York traffic.

 

Sugar giggles and bops him on the nose. “You’re funny,” and with that, she and the puppy (Zeke, he reminds himself, even though he’s sure the puppy thinks it’s name is Marty now) head toward the door.

 

“Coming?” she holds out her hand and he takes it happily.

 

She even deans to sit beside him in the choir room. It’s all going swimmingly, until Artie decides that he just doesn’t take no for an answer.

 

He thinks with his stupid moves and his dumb song that he’ll get somewhere but he won’t. Artie doesn’t realize that what Sugar and he share is completely beyond anyone’s comprehension.

 

(And why is Dad taking his side?)

 

And then Sugar has the audacity to change her mind. She tells him later, brushing it off with a shrug that it’s not like she had chosen definitively anyways.

 

“I’m going home.” The words come before the thoughts are fully formed. He’ll make her jealous or sad or something, anything to remind her that this isn’t some dumb puppy love.

 

“What?”

 

“I’m going to tell them that my visa is expiring and I’m going home.” He takes a step back and turns away from her before he loses his nerve. “You can’t seem to find the answer Sugar, so I’m going to. I’m sick of it here, I want home.”

 

“Rory wait—-” but it’s too late. He’s already walked away, away from her, away from her help, away from any more of the Sugar Lopez-Pierce’s bullshit.

 

He goes home to Brittany’s (not home, never will be) and he gets out his notebook and honestly puts thought into his plan. He’ll take out every book of quantum mechanics and read every piece of pop culture he can on time travel. He’s sick of 2012, sick of the past, sick of being stuck living someone else’s present.

 

As he writes notes about flux-capacitors down, pencil snapping in anger, an old song comes to mind. It’s not clear at first, but it reminds him of Dad and Papa sitting at the piano in the living room, hands mapping over each others as they struggle to play the same tune.

 

The lyrics become clear and he knows what song he’ll sing this week. Because the greatest love songs for him remind of his parents and home, and to a degree the friends he’s made here, the people he knows so well and not at all.

 

He practices his lie, he watches himself perform it in the mirror until he starts to believe again that he’s that same Irish exchange student that landed on the doorstep of Brittany’s house.

 

_I want to go home, I’ve got to go home._   
_Let me go home._

 

The tears come hard as he tries to keep them at bay. He can’t look anywhere in the room without seeing tears in someone’s eye. He can’t look at Dad or Uncle Finn or even Sugar.

 

Sugar it seems, can’t keep her eyes off of him. She leaps up at the end of his song and approaches him. He tries to be mad at her, remember that she’s fickle and she flip-flops and she’s the one that got him into this whole mess in the first place, but when she asks him to be her date, he can’t say no.

 

He can blame Cupid or being stuck in the past or any number of things, but it won’t change the fact that he’s somehow fallen in love with her.

 

“I’m going to miss you so much,” she announces out of the blue at the dance. People are all around, and he can barely hear her, so happy to just be dancing with her, having a date on Valentine’s that for a second he doesn’t catch her drift.

 

“When you get deported, silly,” she teases him, shaking his neck a little and winks.

 

His face falls and he realizes that he does still want to go home, but not without her. “Don’t worry about that now, let’s just think about tonight.”

 

She smiles and he’s hooked. “Maybe my dad can buy Ireland!” she teases him, and he knows she’s telling him that she’ll help, that they’ll go home together. It’s the perfect Valentine’s.

 

“I have one more thing to do as hostess.” Sugar unwinds herself from him and hops up on the stage.

 

“Okay everyone, it’s time for my extra special guest. Back from the dead and cute and compact as ever!” she throws her hand to the back of the room and Rory turns.

 

“This song is dedicated to all the lovers in the room.” Relief, sweet relief floods Rory’s veins as Blaine whips off his velvet heart eye patch and bounces towards the stage.

 

“Happy Valentine’s day,” Sugar whispers as she hops up onto the table beside him. It takes him a minute to recognize the song but there it is, and of course. 

 

Love Shack. As loud and jovial as any time Rory’s ever heard it. Blaine’s careering across the stage, heading towards Kurt and Dad’s face explains everything to Rory.

 

This is their ritual, this is their tradition, this is their love story written out across music and lyrics. Not just this song, but the tens of others like it that have filled up every corner of Rory’s life since birth.

 

That’s what Rory wants for himself. And whether it’s with Sugar or some girl he doesn’t even know yet, that’s what he’s going to strive to have.   
  


That’s his love song.


	13. Your Future Is So Much More Than You Can Imagine.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rory wants the New Directions to know that their future is so much better than they can ever imagine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during the "Peanut Butter" scene in On My Way.

He wants to tell them how wrong they are. How all their dreams are so small and insignificant compared to what the future really holds. But he’s learning. He’s learning there’s a fine balance and that the pain, the suffering, the heartache has to be gone through before you can get to the good.   
  
He squeezes Sugar’s hand, the peanut butter on his lips still leaving a lingering scent. Noel’s allergy is so severe that there’s never been anything nut-related in the house, and Rory’s never minded that, never felt bothered by the fact before, but you’re never bothered by what you don’t know you’re missing, are you?  
  
He listens quietly as the New Directions tell everyone that one thing they want to see. Some of them are so right that it makes Rory’s heart ache with joy that these people, these friends of his, are going to get everything they deserve, while others he just wants to tell them to dream bigger because they can.   
  
He wants to tell Sam that he gets the financial stability that he’s looking for and that it won’t come at the cost of his own dreams soon. That success will never come easy for him, but it will always be there when he deserves it.   
  
He wants Mercedes to know that while she hasn’t met Rachel’s children yet, that there’s still time, and that in the meantime, she’s pretty happy with her own son and being a doting Auntie to plenty of other kids while Rachel gets around to having her own.   
  
He looks at Sugar when Artie tells them he wants to see his kid’s first steps. He knows she’s conflicted about what she’s learned, but he’s always been a dad to her, and Rory just wishes Sugar would remember that.   
  
She squeezes his hand back and tells everyone she’s looking forward to the third Sex and the City and Rory has to laugh because he gets the significance, even if the rest of them won’t for another 10 years.   
  
Puck’s goal, is the least ambitious of them all. To just graduate high school, to make it out of that year, and only see less than 4 months into the future. Rory looks at Sugar and he can see that even she’s having a hard time not telling him that in a few years, after a few more bumps, he’s going to discover he’s got a really good talent at taking disenfranchised kids like him and turning them around through tough love and careful guidance. When he gets recognized at a National level a few years after that, he’ll thank Coach Bieste and Mr. Schuester for even looking sideways at a kid like him, who went from tossing kids into dumpsters to defending them in under 3 years.   
  
Uncle Finn’s wish stops him for a minute. He knows abstractly the details. How Burt and Finn will spend the next 3 years petitioning for better rights for the boys who come back from war changed and broken. He doesn’t realize that it all started here. He’s grateful now for the understanding of where the effort and drive comes from. That it has deep roots and strong emotions, a buoy for Finn as he drifts along a sea of change.   
  
Quinn’s declaration is almost humorous. Sugar catches Rory’s eye and they share a secret smile for Quinn who isn’t home free yet, who still has trials to overcome, but when she does come out in the end she’s holding an Oscar and planning on a memoir about how she changed her life around in High School. In their future,  **_Lucy_ **  has been on the non-fiction list as a best seller for nearly a year and the movie rights have been in a bidding war almost as long. Quinn’s valedictorian speech at Yale is just a footnote in the astronomical impact she makes in the world.   
  
He wraps his arm around Sugar as Santana declares she just wants her grandmother to love her. Sugar’s hand twitches slightly and he knows that as hard as it for him to see Blaine and Kurt struggling through this week, it’s been just as hard for Sugar all year. Even the fact that Brittany just wants Lord Tubbington’s ecstasy habit can’t make her smile.   
  
Blaine’s declaration breaks his heart because he keeps forgetting over and over again that gay rights are still an issue here. The idea that kids still kill themselves over their sexuality, are still bullied and feel belittled by church and state is so foreign, so unimaginably offensive (and not just because he has two fathers and a grandfather who pushes for Gay Rights like it’s the reason he was put on this earth) that when someone brings it up, Rory temporarily feels alarmed, then confused, then ashamed to be a part of a time where it’s not normal to have your gay dads be married in the eyes of the law. Above all else, he wants to tell Blaine that the day is coming soon (though probably not as soon as he’d like) and that he’ll celebrate by threatening Kurt to have 50 different weddings just to say they did and that they could. That Kurt gives in far too easily and the whirlwind extravaganza starts in Ohio and ends in New York and there are 50 different shots of Blaine crying at his wedding vows that Kurt has framed and mounted in a custom frame that runs the length of the door frame outside the bed they’ve shared for almost 20 years.   
  
He grins at the fact that Mike just wants to dance at Carnegie Hall and Tina just wants one song because they’ll spend the rest of their lives dancing and singing, sometimes together, often times not, paving the way in the Asian-American community for better understanding of the arts education and the opportunities presented to minorities.   
  
It’s interesting that Kurt’s dream, the one that speaks to him loudly enough to be echoed in the circle has to do with his dad in congress. It’s moments like these, when Kurt seems to be as mature as the father Rory’s grown up with, that he wonders if Kurt’s ever been a child, had childish thoughts like being an astronaut or a Disney prince. He knows that there’s no way Kurt could possibly comprehend the inroads that Burt will make as a Congressman, this term and the three terms that follow it. He doesn’t think anyone has any idea how instrumental, how pivotal getting Burt to run for Congress was. Congressman Hummel, who will be known for being a democrat with an uncanny sense of business, true family values and the impact of  military on the country and more personally at home. When Burt retires from politics (but not the tire shop, never the tire shop) he’ll start the campaign for better supports in school for the arts and against bullying and prejudice. He will be known as the voice for the kids who don’t quite fit in. And that’s without even mentioning his inroads into parental support for queer youth. He rewards Kurt with a smile, because for him it really does get better.   
  
Compared to her personality, Rachel’s dream seems so small to her, so insignificant to Rory because of course it’s true. He knows what’s in store for her, and the simplicity of just wanting to stay friends with the people that are here when he knows her stardom aspirations warms him from head to toe. Everyone gives his Aunt a bad rap, it’s hard sometimes not to because she pushes and pulls and screams even when she’s been heard loud and clear. But it’s because she loves too much. She loves all of them so much that sometimes it just doesn’t come out right, but he’s glad she can say it here. Glad that she can make her intentions known.   
  
And then it’s his turn. He can’t think of what he wants, because he knows the future, knows all the potential it has to bring. He picks up the peanut butter and has another bite, taking the time to think.  
  
“I’m really looking forward to winning at Regionals.”   
  
Because sometimes it’s about living for the future, but right now it’s about living in the moment. So that’s what he’ll do.


	14. Little Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This week isn’t about Cooper, not really. In the grand scheme that is Kurt and Blaine, Cooper being at McKinley this week is a funny anecdote at best.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Big Brother.

Everyone always assumes that Rory is genetically an Anderson. He doesn’t see it unless he’s standing beside just Papa or Uncle Cooper. Only then does he see it in his jawline, and sometimes in his forehead. He’s proud of looking like a Hummel, of sharing the same face that Grandpa Burt passed down to Dad and Dad passed on to him. 

It’s not that he doesn’t want to be an Anderson. In fact he’s been raised to believe that no matter whose sperm mixed with whose egg he’ll always be equal parts Hummel and Anderson because it’s how you’re raised and who you’re raised by that matters more than the way your DNA twists. 

So he knows he’s got as much of Blaine in him as Kurt no matter what his genetics say. And if he’s got Blaine in him, then he has Cooper in him too. 

Having a little bit of Cooper in you is like having a tornado of energy stored inside your soul that threatens to burst out of your chest and destroy everything in the path. He can’t imagine what it’s like to be the real thing. 

But this week isn’t about Cooper, not really. In the grand scheme that is Kurt and Blaine, Cooper being at McKinley this week is a funny anecdote at best. A catalyst perhaps, or just a defining moment when boys start to grow into men and realize that relationships take effort. 

This week is really about the dog. 

It’s amazing how something that seems so big in the moment can become insignificant and something so small becomes so important. 

It’s funny how Finn winning 14 stuffed animals for a girl who he almost married has a far bigger impact on the future than two brothers reconciling after years of rocky relationship. 

It’s ironic that Rory is spending this much time thinking about a stuffed dog that was won at a Six Flag on a Senior Skip Day that isn’t even his. 

He almost misses Kurt rescue Margaret Thatcher. Rachel is too busy trying to protect the mountain of cheap plushies from the greedy hands of Mercedes, Tina, Brittany and Sugar to notice her best friend slide the dog from the bottom of the pile. 

Kurt holds the soft yellow lab up to take a better look and a soft smile graces his face. Rory’s hand itches out of instinct, wanting to take it from him and hold it to his chest. 

_Gentle baby, that’s not your toy, it’s Papa’s._

The memory is as tactile and real as the boy sitting in front of him, discreetly slipping the dog into his vest. 

It’s as clean and whole as it’ll ever be. Even the expert hands of a fashion designer can only stitch holes together and replace eyes so many times before a little toy begins to show its age. 

He slides next to Kurt on the bus and grins. “I saw what you did.” 

Kurt has the decency to look guilty for a moment. “I thought Blaine might need cheering up. He’s so…” Kurt can’t quite find the words to describe Blaine’s solid and patient divorce from everything.

_The dog will stay in Lima with Blaine during the year apart. It sees New York through the lens of a webcam but stays home on weekends when its owner takes the train from Columbus, Ohio to Penn Station._

“It reminds me of him.” Rory picks at the hem of his shirt, unsure of where to draw the line between truth and lies. 

Kurt pulls the dog out so just the head is peering out from the vest flap. ”It does look like him, doesn’t it?” Kurt eyes are fond and full of affection even when Blaine’s not there to see. “With those big sad brown eyes.” 

_The dog will go into a box when its owner moves to New York for good. It will be moved from dorm to apartment that it shares with far too many other relics of childhood to another apartment far less cluttered. It’s there that the dog is dusted off again, for good._

“I should give it to him tomorrow.” Kurt tucks the dog back in his vest. “I think he needs it more than Rachel does. He must be upset if he didn’t want to come with us. He loves Roller Coasters you know? He worked at this terrible show here over the summer and then I’d meet him here in the afternoon and we’d ride the coasters until the park closed.” 

Rory knows, he’s heard the story what feels like a million times. It still makes him happy, to hear how much things hadn’t changed. His parents still told the same stories, they still prize a little puppy won in a Skeeball game.

The story continued in his head. The tale his Fathers used to tell him before they tucked him in.

_The dog would start to appear all over the apartment, as if it had a will of its own. Finally, it appears on top of the piano perched beside a pair of soft blue baby booties and a note that says ‘I’m ready when you are’._

_The dog will never be put away in another box ever again._

He watches from around the corner a day later when Kurt presents the dog to Blaine. They talk brothers and family and the dog’s glassy eyes stare up at Blaine as Kurt implores him to make up with Cooper because family is hard, but it’s family. 

_The dog will move to a bigger house before the babies come. It will be sat on a shelf in the nursery, taken down to be played with gently, but little hands are never gentle. The dog will be put through the wash in seemingly endless cycles. Its fur will be ripped during tantrums and thrown across rooms when little children don’t know how else to express their anger at the world. The yellow fur eventually turns a white grey with age, but the relationship that brings the dog to its owner never fades._

Blaine doesn’t take the dog from Kurt right away. He stalks off to the auditorium because he knows Kurt is right. He does make up with Cooper and later he’ll take the dog from Kurt and snuggle with it, before placing it on his bedside table beside the picture of his boyfriend. 

It’s the little things in life that stick with us. 


	15. Interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rory manages to make it back to his present, but things aren’t how he left them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Saturday Night Gleever and takes place during and after Quiet Prayers which is part of the Noel Chronicles.

Sugar obviously didn’t expect it to work. He can tell because in the split second before he’s pulled roughly from 2012 and deposited back into 2035 he watches her eyes go wide and her mouth form a perfect  _Oh_.

He feels a rush of air and the cool prick of air conditioning on his skin. 

“You need to go.” he recognizes Kurt’s voice, but it’s older and there’s a tired edge to it, like he’s exhausted. Rory knows in an instant he must be in the future because Dad sounds like Dad and not Kurt. 

“I’m not going Kurt. That’s stupid.” Blaine sounds equally at the end of his rope. Rory hears a faint beeping noise and he realizes that they’re in a hospital, he’s in a hospital. 

“So you’re calling me stupid?” 

“Kurt. Stop it.” 

And his parents are fighting. 

Rory doesn’t know what’s going on but the mere idea of his parents fighting makes his stomach clench and his heart leap into his throat. He has a powerful urge to throw up and that has nothing to do with the hospital (he thinks) because his parents never, ever fight. 

He tries to say something to make it stop, but he feels dizzy from the effort and his head swims. He tries to keep conscious but it’s a losing battle. 

“I’m serious Blaine, go.” 

That’s all that Rory hears as he falls back into unconsciousness. 

He expects to wake back up in 2012 but when he regains consciousness he’s still in the hospital and all he can hear is Kurt crying. This time he doesn’t even fight it when staying awake become difficult. It’s just not worth it. 

It’s hours before he regains consciousness again. This time he manages to open his eyes just a crack and the whole world swims in and out of focus, tilting and shifting as if he’s being rocked. 

“I don’t want them to fight.” He hears his sister’s voice above the buzzing in his ears. 

“They’re not fighting.” Noel’s voice is quiet and disengaged. Rory rolls his head to the side slightly and sees the top of his brother’s head, face pressed close to the hospital blankets in frustration. He flexes his fingers trying to tap Noel’s shoulder, but it’s like they’re made of lead instead of muscle and he can’t make it the mere inches between where they’re lying and where Noel is. 

“I’m not a baby Noel. Daddy and Papa were fighting and I want them to stop.” 

“They weren’t fighting,” Noel repeats, his words swallowed by cheap sheets.

“Daddy told Papa not to touch him,” Katy rationalizes. Rory rolls his head to see her now and she’s curled up on a plastic chair. She’s such a tiny little thing with Blaine’s huge brown eyes that show every emotion she’s feeling. 

“Katy just shut up already, I don’t want to hear it.”

“Don’t tell me to shut up.”

Noel sits up and throws his head back dramatically. ”Seriously Katy shut up.” 

“No.” Katy unfurls from the chair. “I hate you and I hate stupid Rory.” She pounds the bed with her fists and lets out a shriek of rage. “This is all his fault. Daddy and Papa never fight and now they are and it’s all his fault.” 

Her words cut through Rory like a hot knife and he feels bile rise in his throat as he actually does throw up, the guilt in his stomach bubbling to the surface. Katy screams again and suddenly there are more people by Rory’s bed. He tries to force his eyes open but someone beats him to it, yanking his eyelids open and shining a light directly into them. 

“Can you hear me?” someone asks and Rory finds his voice still gone. He nods weakly, head feeling like it’s filled with rocks and fuzz, the smell of his own puke finally reaching him. There are hands all over him, checking him over and he’s confused and just wants to close his eyes all over again. He squeezes his eyes shut wondering if he can get back to 2012, if he has time to fix things. He needs to find Sugar and to figure out how to put things back to right. 

“Rory?” he feels yet another pair of hands on him, gentler this time, pushing his hair back and stroking his forehead. He licks his lips as a second pair of hands find his own and squeeze gently. The calluses on Blaine’s hand are familiar and safe and Kurt’s cool and comforting. He tries to speak again, to tell them that whatever’s happened isn’t worth fighting over but he can’t. 

Delicate, deft hands change his sheets and help him out of his hospital gown as warm ones rub his back like he’s a child. “It’s okay.” Blaine must be right beside him because his voice is soft but crystal clear. “You hit your head on the sidewalk Rory. You’ve got a bad concussion but it’s going to be okay.” 

“Don’t fight.” Rory manages finally, the words thick and slow. He can hear his fake accent trying to slip through, like he’s forgotten how to be his true self. He turns slightly to look at Blaine, pleading with him silently. 

“No one’s fighting,” Blaine promises. 

Rory accepts Kurt’s gentle nudging into a clean gown. He turns to him and finds his dad smiling, eyes red with tears. “Don’t fight,” he repeats to Kurt, affirming his stance. 

A worry line appears across Kurt’s forehead as he sits down across from Blaine. “No one’s fighting Rory,” he assures him. 

“You.” Rory tries, thinking this is too much for how foggy he feels. 

“Me.” Kurt looks at Blaine in surprise. “Us?” 

“Yes.” Rory lets his head drop back onto his pillow, fighting again to stay awake. 

“We’re not fighting,” Blaine and Kurt both begin to say. They look at each other with such a shared confusion that Rory has to believe them. 

“Promise?” he tries. 

“Promise,” Kurt assures him, taking Blaine’s hand and squeezing it gently. “Rory you need to stay awake.” 

But he can’t, it’s too hard. He closes his eyes again. 

He wakes up an hour later to his fathers discussing something with someone who isn’t trying particularly hard to be quiet. 

“But I need to see him like now.” Sugar’s voice is relentless but familiar in a way Rory never thought it would be. “It’s really, really important.” 

“Sugar, he’s got to rest, he has a bad concussion and trouble staying awake.” Kurt’s voice is just completely worn down now, quiet and defeated. “We’ll call your mom when he can have visitors, but not right now.” 

He can practically hear her plan forming from his prone position on the bed. 

“We’re dating.” Sugar puts on her pouty face and he can just tell she’s giving them big sad eyes. “I just—can I sit with him?” Rory doesn’t know whether he should be impressed or horrified at her ability to manipulate. 

“You’re…dating?” Blaine confirms slowly, as if this is a piece of information he just can’t process. 

“Yes,” Sugar confirms. “He gave me a puppy and I’d really like to see him now. Privately. Thanks.” she brushes past them (and it can’t be hard because Rory suspects they’ve gone into an advance state of shock at all this news) and sits beside his bed, poking him gently. “Are you awake?” she leans in close. “We need to talk.” 

Rory pretends to be unconscious. He doesn’t really want to deal with Sugar until he has the mental capacities to think in more than two words at a time. 

“You’re faking and that’s sweet and all, but I really need you to not because we have to go back Rory.” 

“No,” Rory whispers back at her, cracking his eye open just a slit to show her he’s serious.

“Yes. It didn’t work.” She smooths his hair down and stands back up, pressing a kiss to the side of his mouth. “I’ll see you later sweetie.” she announces happily. “We can talk then,” and with that she flounces from the room, seemingly satisfied with the results of her little visit. 

“No,” Rory mumbles closing his eyes. He won’t go back, and Sugar can’t make him. He’s home now, and here to stay.


	16. Cornerstone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone once told Blaine that brutal honesty is the cornerstone of any relationship. He passes on similar advice to his youngest son.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Dance with Somebody (and also in the future)

Kurt and Blaine fighting, as McKinley High learns during the infamous Whitney Houston week of 2012, is a terrible thing to witness. Mike Chang likes to tell an exaggerated version of it later, complete with horror story sound effects. 

Rory will never know that Mike exaggerates and that it was over about as quick and painlessly as anyone could have asked of two hormonally charged, emotionally fragile boys. He’ll never know how close his parents came to breaking up. He’ll never know that there was a second boy who tried to claw his way to a claim that would never be his, that Sebastian was just the warning signs. 

Rory will never know that had he stayed he would have made things so, so much worse. For himself, for Kurt, for Blaine, for the future. 

He’ll never know, because during Whitney week he’s back in the future, safe and sound. 

Sugar’s words weigh on him, the insistence that they need to go back. He doesn’t understand why, never understood why they were there in the first place, but she won’t stop bothering him about it. She comes three more times before Rory “accidentally” mentions to Blaine that she’s giving him a headache. 

He doesn’t see Sugar again after that, but it doesn’t stop her from texting. He tries to ignore her, and frankly, it’s easy because Kurt and Blaine are all over him now and it feels fantastic after wanting their affection for weeks. 

(It feels odd thinking of them as Dad and Papa now. Thinking Kurt and Blaine has become second nature. He tries to pretend it hasn’t but he catches himself slipping up, accidentally addressing them as friends instead of parents.) 

They’re gathering up his things now, preparing to leave the hospital. He suspects he would have been released sooner had he not accidentally mentioned that he believed he’d been stuck in the past for several months, orhad he not accidentally answered in an Irish accent when they’d asked him if he was still feeling foggy. 

The car ride home is quiet, Kurt, drives, glancing back at Rory every few seconds to make sure he’s still there. Rory flushes under the attention, smiling at him. He lets Blaine help him inside the house and the sight of it, so exactly as he left it (and he really just did, he needs to keep reminding himself of that) is almost enough to bring him to tears. He brushes it off as exhaustion and begs off to lie down on the couch. 

It’s there that the trouble begins. 

Rory knows on some level he’s to blame. When he’d woken up Noel had been there and the adage that  _absence makes the heart grow fonder,_  well it’s absolutely true. 

It’s odd because he can count the number of times on one hand that he thought about his brother while he was stuck in the past. But Noel’s always been there for him and seeing him looking so freaked out makes Rory remember just how close they are. 

(He takes advantage of it, they both do. They’ve been in each other’s pockets for as long as they’ve had cognisant memories to the point where they’re extensions of each other rather than two separate people.)

Noel has up until this point shared every experience with him, and while Rory’s thankful to have something of his own (no matter how outlandish or unlikely it was), he wishes the instant he sees his brother that they had shared it. 

That would have been a horrible idea, he realizes in retrospect, because while Rory is even tempered and waits out the storm, Noel chases them down with intent to fix even that which does not need fixing.

For example, he thinks as Noel crowds his personal space, he just wants a few minutes of peace to revel in the success of having made it home and all Noel wants to do is check on him. His brother sprawls on the floor in front of the couch so that they can talk without Rory looking up or moving. It’s obvious that Noel isn’t getting up soon because Seamus has planted himself firmly in Noel’s lap, his shaggy white head flat against Noel’s thigh. 

“You’re dating Sugar?” Noel’s whisper is exasperated, like he’s beyond the point of confirmation and well into the realm of accusation. Rory’s actually surprised it’s taken this long to come up, but he suspects that Noel has been trying to start this conversation for days only to be stopped by their parents. 

“Yes.” Rory draws the answer out. He and Sugar are dating, or they were in 2012 and he suppose it still holds in 2035. 

“Sugar Lopez-Pierce. Crazy Sugar.” Noel seems to be having a difficult time with the concept. 

“Yup,” his regular voice sounds strange and thick, “that Sugar.” 

“Are you sure you just hit your head on Saturday?” Noel probably means it as a joke, but it stings none the less. He seems to realizes that when Rory goes silent and he slides up the couch to invade even more space by sitting practically on top of him. 

“Pretty sure,” Rory volleys back. 

Noel is silent for a few minutes, hands fluttering nervously in his lap. Rory sits up so that there’s more room for both of them on the couch and they sit, close but not touching, each lost in meditation. 

“You really think you were in the past.” Rory wonders if Noel’s wanted to ask this more than anything else.

“I—-” It’s difficult to answer that, yes he believes he really was in the past, suspects that if he managed to unearth an old yearbook or some Glee Club memorabilia he’ll find Sugar and himself staring back at him but he’s also not going to go looking to prove he’s not crazy because proof would make everything infinitely worse some how. 

“What were Dad and Papa like?” If Noel believes him, he won’t admit it, but he’s also curious by nature and the idea that Rory got to interact with the extinct species that was their parents as teens must be driving him wild. 

“The same. Different — they touched less.” Saying they touched less is akin to saying that its not wet on a cloudless day. The two are completely incomparable because the one was two boys who’s interactions took place prominently in a homophobic school in a homophobic town and the other was two grown men, married years and years in a city that in general just doesn’t care. 

The reality of the statement, the simple statement of truth, seems to light something inside of Noel and he just won’t shut up. Whether he’s testing Rory or he’s hungry for knowledge (although what good it will do Rory doesn’t know because Dad and Papa are literally exactly as he left them, their squabbles amounting to no more than who’s turn it is to walk the dog or if Blaine should be entrusted with Sunday night dinner or not) it’s hard to tell, but Noel keeps the questions coming to the point where he barely stops for sleep. 

School comes Monday morning and Rory insists that he’s fine and that he wants to go mostly to avoid being a sitting target for Sugar and because he really just wants to get back to living his life instead of someone else’s. If he thinks that this will somehow sate Noel he’s gravely mistaken. Their shared schedule includes Music, AP Lit and AP History. They sit next to each other because they’re close as twins but today Rory wishes he could switch seats with just about anyone. 

_Was Aunt Rachel with Uncle Finn or not?_

_Did you meet Quinn Fabray?_

_Are you sure you’re okay? You look weird._

_Wait so you’re saying YOU were Itchy the Christmas Elf?_

_Do you want to go home?_

There’s Rory’s out and he takes it, practically fleeing from the second floor classroom down to the nurse’s office. He calls Papa, thanking every Deity he can think of that his father stays at home. Blaine’s there as fast as he can be and he relaxes visibly when he sees that Rory’s just overwhelmed rather then ill. 

“Let’s go get lunch,” Blaine suggests, wrapping an arm securely around Rory’s shoulder. Rory sinks into his Papa’s touch. Blaine’s hugs are the most reassuring things on the planet. They say exactly what he’s feeling in a way his words can’t possibly express. 

He doesn’t let go until they’re at the cafe around the corner. Rory considers momentarily that he’s gauging to see if Rory needed a break from class or really needs to go home for the day to shake off whatever’s bothering him. They sit in silence for a while, Blaine tapping a faint rhythm out on the table unconsciously with his fork. 

“Sorry for making you come get me.” Rory’s too tired to explain himself right now. Being outside makes it better, but he doesn’t want to go back home knowing the the school day is going to end and Noel will just be back on top of him. “

“Everything okay?” Blaine’s got a worried expression on his face, eyes huge and dog like. 

“I just—feel overwhelmed.” it’s the first time he’s admitted it out-loud and once he’s said it he realizes that it’s not just Noel that’s overwhelming him but Sugar as well. She’s texted almost 50 times since Saturday and while the attention should be nice it certainly doesn’t feel that way. 

“Noel?” it’s not an accusation, but a statement. There’s no judgement from Blaine even though Noel’s biologically his and Rory is Kurt’s. 

“A little. Sugar too.” Rory feels guilty just admitting because it feels ungrateful to want to shun the attention. 

“You know someone told me a long time ago that brutal honesty was the cornerstone of any relationship.” Blaine looks up at him again and his eyes affirm that there’s no judgement on his part, that he honestly just wants to make this better for his son. “They were wrong. Well—no. Honesty is up there but communication is the most important. I know it’s hard too, I’m not going to tell you its—-” he pauses and takes a breath to collect himself, “honest communication,” he starts again, “good relationships, any relationship, the cornerstone needs to be honest communication.” His phone buzzes on the table and he flips it over, glancing at it for just a minute then looking back to Rory as it buzzes again, “here, watch.” he picks it up and from the immediate shrill tone on the other end, it’s clear that it’s Kurt and he’s none too pleased. 

“I’m sorry I didn’t call when I picked him up,” Blaine starts. “But Kurt, screaming at me isn’t working for me right now,” he hums at Kurt’s response, winking at Rory. “He’s okay, I promise. We’re eating lunch and we can swing by your office after if you want proof, or you can believe me,” he chuckles. “Alright, yes, I get it, I’d want to see him too. We’ll see you in a bit.” He smiles at whatever Kurt says next. “I love you,” his voice drips with affection and the casualness of the declaration fills Rory with a warm feeling. 

Blaine hangs the phone up and places it back on the table. “See, it’s not hard but it takes practice. I’ve had a lot. Dad’s had a lot. You just need to start flexing that muscle.” He flags the waitress for the bill and some to-go boxes. Honest communication might be a cornerstone of Kurt and Blaine’s relationship but so is knowing that Kurt Hummel wasn’t born with patience nor has he learned it during his 42 years on earth. 

They get up to leave and Blaine gives him a tight squeeze, reassuring Rory once more that whatever trials he might face, that he’s got his parents backing him as well. They head back to the car and Blaine turns to him one last time. 

“Or you could sing.” his Papa’s eyes are alight with merriment.

“No,” Rory responds with a laugh.

“It works,” Blaine assures him. “Well mostly. Singing and then communicating, sometimes at the same time.” 

Rory shakes his head. “I’m not singing to Noel,” he insists. 

“Sugar?” Blaine tries. 

“Papa.” Rory rolls his eyes. 

“She’s a Lopez-Pierce, a little song, a little dance might really get through to her.” Rory shakes his head, laughing none the less. He’s not sure there’s a song on earth that could possibly accurately explain what he’s gone through with her and how he feels, but he’ll table Blaine’s suggestion for later. 

Maybe. 


	17. The Kids (Are Not) Alright

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rory and Sugar return to McKinley

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Choke

It was suppose to be an innocent movie date at Sugar’s house _,_  Sugar’s real house. The one in New York where she lived with her mothers part-time in a huge purple leopard print room so bright it makes Rory squint. 

Instead he falls asleep and when he wakes up, the movie is over, Sugar is gone and Aunt Brittany is standing over top of him, biting her lower lip nervously. 

“You need to go get her.” Aunt Brittany’s voice is soft and pleading. “Please Rory—I’ll tell your dads you’re staying over tonight.” 

For a minute he doesn’t understand and when he doesn’t he tries so hard to say  _no._

In the end he agrees because she sounds so desperate for his help. “Tell her to stop —- that it’s okay, she doesn’t need to fix things.” Her tone has an odd wistful quality to it. 

Going back is slightly less disconcerting this time. He understands the disorientation, the pull, the press of hot metal when she places the penny in his palm. This time he slips it into his pocket hoping he can get back on his own if he has to. 

Finding Sugar is easy, she presses herself back into the mould of McKinley as if it’s her second skin. She’s established herself with Santana and Brittany, using her time in the Troubletones to make her presences familiar and welcome. He on the other hand scrambles to figure out where he is. 

“Rory!” Finn claps him on the back, the sheer pressure sending him forward a few inches as he tries to open his locker. “How’re you feeling. Man a two week flu! Hope you’re not contagious, Rachel will  _kill_  me if I get her sick before her NYADA audition.” 

Rory has literally never loved his uncle more than in that moment. “That’s this week?”  

He’s about to ask Finn for more — desperate to know that nothing has changed here either since he’s been gone. New Directions is forever breaking up, that he’s learned. “Is—-“

“RORY!” Sugar’s voice is so loud it echoes back at the down the hall. “You came back!” 

Finn looks between them, confused. “It was just the flu Sugar, didn’t you have it too?” he pauses. “Are you sure it wasn’t mono? Because I had that and it sucks.”  

“Must have been.” Sugar gives him a smile as sweet as her name, fingers curling around Rory’s arm, preparing to drag him away. “Come on Rory, let’s go make out.” 

Finn gives him a half-hearted wave as she spins on her heels and drags him off.

“You said you weren’t coming back.” He notices that she’s changed into a far more complicated outfit then she was wearing on their date. 

“I wasn’t.” He looks down at his own clothes and exhales in relief when he realizes nothing he’s wearing says  _Hummable Designs_  or that bears the familiar  _H-A_  insignia of the youth line. This would not be the week to let Kurt see just how much his future will hold. “Your mom told me to come get you.” 

Her eyes are wide, giving her an innocent quality. It’s time like these that he can tell she’s been raised mostly by Brittany as she danced her way across country. “I can’t go back. Not yet. It’s not perfect yet.” 

“Why does it have to be perfect?” They’ve gone back. They’ve seen that nothing changes, that everything is right and he can’t get past her need for this unattainable, unneeded perfection. Everything works out in the end, so why does she keep insisting it won’t.

“It just does.” Her eyes flash angrily, from Bambi to the Evil Queen in 5 seconds flat. “Come one, we have glee, think you can manage that?” 

She’s cool to him for the rest of the week, but it’s alright because for every degree of iciness she shows him, the Glee club guys (except Kurt who sniffs at the thought of working out in the weight room) are warm and welcoming, accepting him back instantaneously as if he never left. 

It’s why he agrees to help Puck study for the European Geography exam. The boys all think it’s a brilliant plan because Rory is ‘actually’ from Europe and therefore it’s just Geography to him. 

Puck’s helpless, they all are to a degree, unsure of how to get through to him, how to get him past the moping and frustration. They order pizza and when they get hungry again during their second (or third if they’re honest) wind Blaine volunteers to do a snack run. 

“I’ll come help.” Rory volunteers instantly, the words escaping him before he thinks. The lines are blurry again, wanting to be Blaine’s friend nearly as much as he aches to be his son. 

Blaine smiles at him and they head out in companionable silence. 

“How was Kurt’s audition?” He plays with his hands in his lap. Kurt had begged off the study session out of sheer exhaustion and Rory had admitted it was probably best considering the lewd jokes and junk food. 

“Amazing.” Blaine’s whole body language is proud, preening if it were his own triumph. “He’s going to kill at NYADA. You should have seen Carmen Tibideaux’s face.”  

Rory knows he will. He watched Kurt from the shadow trying to perfect  _Music of the Night_ (and it makes him smile to remember that Halloween they all watched Phantom curled up on the couch eating fish sticks after a disastrous trick or treating with Finn). He also had sneaked into the back of the auditorium to watch the actual audition and Kurt had just  _blown everyone away_. He knows his father, has seen him perform, but he’s never, ever seen him own a stage like that. 

For a brief second he wonders what it would be like if Kurt had stayed with his Broadway dreams. 

“I hope I can do half as well next year,” Blaine adds quietly. 

He looks at Blaine. “It’s sucks that not everyone’s graduating together.” He pauses for a minute not sure how much he can say. “And I—I—-think you and Kurt’ll be fine.” 

Blaine gives him a bemused look. “Thanks Rory,” he sounds completely genuine. “At least I won’t be alone, Tina’ll still be here, Artie, maybe Puck and Brittany too, and Sugar.” he changes the subject, but Rory doesn’t hear him any more because it finally clicks. 

Brittany’s not going to graduate.

Sugar hates that her mom’s didn’t graduate together. 

He should call her. Tell her that he gets why she’s been so riled up. Graduation’s upon them and there’s nothing Sugar can do to change Brittany’s grades. 

Blaine parks outside the 24 hour convenience store and Rory excuses himself down the pop aisle. He pulls out his phone and dials her, wedged between the diet soda and cheap candy. It’s nearly 5am but she answers regardless. 

“You’re trying to get Brittany to graduate.” It’s part accusation, part statement.   

There’s a pause on the other end, and he knows he’s trapped her. 

“I want her to graduate Rory. I want them all to do what they’re meant to do. They’re just floating through and what if they’re floating in the wrong direction,” she pauses again. “Look at Rachel. You know that’s not suppose to be what happens. You know that’s not her path.” 

“So we need to fix Rachel too?” 

“We need to fix everyone,” she sounds so serious, so determined that in an instant he backs her completely. 

“How?” 

“I don’t know. Give me a day, alright? Stay with me and we can go back when we know everything’ll be okay.” 

Blaine rounds the corner, weighed down by chips. He looks alright to Rory, but Sugar’s words have put him on edge. “Alright, yes,” he agrees. 

They’ll stay until things are set right. 


	18. Bittersweet Victories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rory looks at them, searching for his parents in these young boys…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place between Prom-a-saurus and Nationals

Prom was pretty inconsequential for Rory and Sugar in the end. Quinn walking, while something to celebrate, was wholly expected because she’s not in a wheelchair in the future. And Rachel being prom queen is fact— it’s fact years from now when Santana and Quinn finally confess to giving it to her and then Rachel smacks them and hugs them all at once and cries. A lot. (Of course it doesn’t take much to make rachel cry a lot. Rory’s actually pretty sure she puts the fact she can cry on demand on her resume as a selling point.)

And Rory doesn’t get what the big deal is about Blaine’s hair is because that’s morning hair in his house and Katy’s is so much worse because it’s actual curly hair that just happened when she woke up one morning and Kurt was both elated to have something to style and then endlessly frustrated when it wouldn’t lie how he wanted it to no matter how much conditioner and de-tangler he put in it.

Sugar gets caught trying to sneak into Figgins’ office to try and change Brittany’s permanent record to something that could graduate, but Coach Roz catches her and kicks her out before she can accomplish anything. He suspects that she’d get in further trouble but Mr. Motta buys the school off in one way or another, and the faculty all ends up trying to figure out how the punch still managed to get spiked with Coach Slyvester hoovering beside it all night. Why she can’t have Mr. Motta buy her mom a degree is beyond him, but he supposes there might actually be a limit to legal exchanges of money. 

Rory supposes he should feel thankful that he’ll experience a prom of his own that’s really truly his. Sugar laughs and tells him that it’s all very Back to the Future but he thinks that was more Valentine’s Day. They bicker playfully about it, but he can tell she’s starting to panic because the chances of Brittany graduating this year are getting slimmer with every passing day. 

It doesn’t help that the Glee Club are far more focused on Nationals than school work. Rory gets that too. Coach Sylvester is obsessed with props and Flashdance, while Schuester is almost feverishly insisting on Paradise by the Dashboard Light as being their banner number. They’ve been given the death slot, first to go, last to place. The only blessing is that her Prom Queen win seems to have been just the ticket to shake Rachel free of her grief and she’s back to being Rachel “All The Solos Belong To Me” Berry. 

Perhaps a little too much back to her former self, driven to the point where she’s beginning to alienate everyone else. He feels it too (he knows he shouldn’t complain, he’s a visitor here, literally and figuratively) they all do, but Tina is apparently finally reached a breaking point. 

Rory feels bad for her. She slides into the background so naturally that even he forgets she’s there sometimes. She’s finally got everyone’s attention now as she storms from the choir room, leaving Mike looking completely baffled in her wake. 

The fact that Tina disappears isn’t strange to Rory. Even later, her own daughter seems to shine brighter than her. Rory rarely thinks of her besides being Angie’s mom or his parents’ friend they see a few times a year. 

Rachel hurries after her as Schuester blusters forward. “Alright, Paradise by the Dashboard Light is a classic rock song…”

Rory tunes him out and looks towards the door. This isn’t a good start to what should be the best performance of their lives. 

It actually isn’t as disastrous as it could have been. Yes, Coach Sylvester won’t stop calling Kurt, Porcelina, and keeps trying to bully him into wearing a sequined flapper dress that’s tacky even by theatre standards. And they still haven’t settled on the use off props or not for Flashdance which is weak enough it should probably be cut in favour of just about anything else. They hear from Kurt and Blaine that Tina had some sort of extremely strange, life changing dream after falling in the fountain at the mall. Apparently she believed she was Rachel Berry. Whatever changed her mind, she’s now happy to make the costumes and sway in the background once more, recruiting Sugar, Rory and Joe to help her. 

Kurt also manages to sneak into Vocal Adrenaline’s practice and video them which earns some good natured teasing from Blaine wanting to know if Kurt met any cute guys. Kurt blushes and shoves him gently and then brushes the shoulder off his cardigan. 

“I told you, I’m satisfied with what I have. Now hush and be impressed by my genius filmmaking.” 

They watch in horror as Vocal Adrenaline kill, even with no audience, performing something called the Human Centipede. Rory’s not sure where it gets its name, but Blaine grumbles that it doesn’t look that hard and later he sees Kurt smack him for his trouble. 

Rory looks at them, searching for his parents in these young boys. Sometimes it’s there, right on the surface, like when Kurt huffs and explains for the thousandth time that appreciating more flattering fashion cuts does not equate strutting around in heels at Nationals when Unique is the real thing. Other times its completely hidden, like how they sit apart from each other in the choir room so as not to accidentally incur any wrath. 

They don’t have the fortune of feeling so sure of their social status like Puck does, appearing before them like a horrifying mirage as Lola. He’s sort of glad because he’s seen the hi-jinx they can get up to when they feel comfortable. Even as a child he found Dad’s turn in Cabaret to be a little much for his tastes. 

Kurt’s comfortable enough in his own skin however to drop by Tina’s costuming sweatshop and show her how to dress up the simple dresses they’ve decided on for Nationals.

“The only problem is we need someone to hand sew the lace,” he sighs. 

“I can hand sew,” Rory shrugs. He’s been able to thread a needle since Preschool and the detailing they want are frankly patterns he could pull off in his sleep. 

Sugar steps on his foot but it’s too late. Kurt sizes him up and down. “Show me. This has to be perfect.”He presents Rory with lace and a swatch of fabric. He’s not phased in the slightest and stitches it quickly. 

“I can hem too, whatever you need.” 

Kurt turns the piece over in his hands, his face unreadable at first. He turns to Rory and surveys him slowly, meeting his eyes with a  “This will do.” he informs them and tosses it back to Tina. “I’ll drop by later with Mercedes to check in.”  

Rory glows with pride, it’ll do, because Kurt was the one who taught him. 

No sooner has the room filled with the whir of sewing machines than Sugar starts complaining. He doesn’t blame her, being shuffled to the back is difficult even when he knows that it’s for a reason. 

Tina scolds her, telling her that her time will come. Rory wants to tell both of them that it won’t not here. They’re getting Brittany to graduate (or not, given the success they’ve had so far) and then it’s back home to star in Glee Clubs and Dance Competitions far away from Ohio in every sense possible. 

Looking back, Rory remembers everything and nothing about Nationals. He remembers falling asleep with Sugar on the bus and waking up disoriented when Finn pokes him at the 15th bathroom stop. He doesn’t remember Rachel banning conversation for the last hour of the journey.  

He remembers them splitting off for food and Mercedes nearly fainting from the food poisoning before they can see The Bean. 

(“Who knows when we’ll ever get back here,” he hears Blaine whisper to Kurt as they trek back to the hotel. Rory refrains from replying “2025. Noel pukes from excitement at the Aquarium.”)

The competition itself is over in a blink of an eye, a tornado of lights, music and applause. Before he knows it he’s standing behind Kurt in the top 3 teams. He places a tentative hand on Kurt’s shoulder, grounding himself there. He doesn’t think he’s suppose to care this much about a win, but he does. He’s really, truly a part of New Directions now. 

Blaine and Kurt stand completely tangled together, hands overlapping so many times they’ve formed a knot and Blaine grins at Rory in a way that makes his heart sing for home again. 

_Your 48th Annual Show Choir National Champions from Lima, Ohio…_

Their screams are deafening. They’ve won. They’re National Champions and suddenly nothing else matters. Kurt grabs him in a hug and the connection buzzes long after he’s fled to hug everyone else in the room. They dissolve into a giant puppy pile of hugs, unsure of how to move from the dressing room later as they sway and hold each other, cheering at random intervals. 

He wonders when the buzz will wear off but it lasts the whole ride home the next day and as they burst through the doors of the school, expecting to find it deserted but instead discover what feels like everyone lining the halls. Instead of slushies they’re throwing confetti and two girls pull him aside and kiss him (Sugar sees an end to that quickly as she yanks him back and literally hisses at them). 

Kurt and Blaine don’t take the sudden affection for the club lightly. They don’t kiss in the hallway like everyone else and then keep a distance, touching no more than to dust the confetti off each other and grin. 

He wants to take them aside and tell them things. Soon, he wants to say. Soon you’ll be in New York together and no one will look at you sideways. Soon this praise and adulation will come so often it will start to lose its shine. Soon you’ll want privacy and to go back to being unknown. 

He can’t tell them any of that though and it makes the victory a little bittersweet. 


	19. Your Future Is So Much More Than You Can Imagine (Reprise)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rory needs Kurt to know that his life isn’t over after the NYADA rejection.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during Goodbye

No one sees much of Kurt and Blaine in the time between the rejection letter incident (fondly referred to years later in the Hummel-Anderson house as that horrible letter that led to brilliant things) and seeing Rachel off at the train. 

Rory knows exactly what they’re doing in that time. They’re honing the comfort routine that only refines itself years into the future. They’re a couple that hurts together, the one typically found in terrible movies or books written by Nicholas Sparks that share emotions across the spectrum. 

Because if Kurt is hurting Blaine is hurting too. 

When they finally do emerge from the cocoon of  _kurtandblaine_  with forced smiles and red eyes to see Rachel off, Rory seizes the opportunity and makes his move. 

Sugar will kill him when she finds out what he’s done. He’ll die a virgin and probably drawn and quartered, his body literally strewn across time and space but he needs to do this. 

“Can I take you two for coffee?” He blocks their exit down the steps. 

They look at each other, sharing a whole dialogue with his eyes. As their son, Rory finds this tic annoying as hell. As their friend, it’s fascinating how in sync they are. 

“Sure,” Blaine offers a friendly smile, “where to.” 

“The Lima Bean.” Rory doesn’t allow for hesitation. He needs to do this as much for Kurt as he does for Blaine and as he does for his own piece of mind. 

They take Blaine’s stationwagon. Rory could tell them the story of the time it breaks down outside of Columbus and how Blaine didn’t realize just how much of a mechanic’s son Kurt was until that moment his boyfriend was literally rebuilding an engine on the side of the road, but he doesn’t because he’s learning some experiences need to be experienced in the present without assistance or foreknowledge. 

Blaine swings into a parking spot towards the back of the coffee shop with ease and they all get out in unison.

“I’ve never seen you drink coffee,” Kurt comments softly as they make their way inside. 

Rory laughs. “I do. We’re addicted in my family.” He steps to the front of the register, it’s mid afternoon and the cafe blessedly empty for once. “Can I get a latte, and—” he almost finishes the coffee order right then and there, but stops because he shouldn’t know their order. 

“A grande non-fat mocha and a medium drip,” Blaine finishes smoothly, smiling at Rory. “We always order the same thing,” he blushes. “It’s sort of our thing.” 

Kurt rolls his eyes fondly. “Speak for yourself. I order the same thing because everything else tastes like car oil.” 

They wait for their order in near silence, making small talk about the weather and summer plans. Kurt and Blaine both assume he’s going back to Ireland, but he’s not so sure any more. He finally understands Sugar’s need to fix things, but at the same time, Kurt’s path is the clearest it’s ever been to him. 

It was hard to think about at the time, but NYADA never made sense to Rory. He knows what’s coming next for Kurt in the sort of general semantics that a child knows their parent’s past. He always assumed that NYADA was some two week failed experiment before Kurt’s real journey began.

They find a table and Rory knows he needs to speak his piece. He looks across at the man who’ll become his father just over a decade from now, stares into the eyes that mirror his in a way only genetics can account for and let’s the words come. 

“I’m sorry about NYADA.” Kurt opens his mouth to reply, the wound is too fresh for him to hear platitudes from the foreign exchange student that he’s shared only a handful of experiences with. But Rory isn’t speaking as the boy from Ireland, he’s speaking as his son. He’s speaking as the little boy who learned to hand sew because he wanted to be just like his father and the older boy who finds his register can reach high notes and is proud he can because it’s not a shameful thing in his house. 

Blaine takes Kurt’s free hand in his own, rubbing slow circles with his thumb, like he’s grounding Kurt there, begging him to let people in enough for comfort. 

“But you’re meant for more than NYADA, Kurt.” He takes a deep breath, balancing delicately on a high wire of too much truth. “Who even says performing is right for you? I mean you’re a great performer, but I think it’s a waste of your potential. You could do everything. You could be a fashion brand—-“ 

He sees Blaine and Kurt’s eyes connect fleetingly for a second and then Kurt’s laughing so hard that it attracts the attention of the few patrons in the cafe. 

For a second the whole world holds still. Blaine looks at Kurt like he’s afraid the breaking point is coming. Finally, Kurt gets a hold of himself enough to continue. 

“That’s very kind of you to assert Rory, but you can’t possibly know. I mean I thought I had NYADA in the bag.” Kurt sighs and spins the coffee cup in his hand slightly. 

“I’m not.” For a fleeting second Rory channels his brother. If Noel were sitting here he’d never take no as an answer. He’d have told Kurt everything, Grandfather Paradoxes and Butterfly Effects be damned. “I have a really good feeling. You’re meant for more Kurt. So much more.” 

Kurt chuckles cooly again, but this time, it feels more like an act, while he lets the thought sink in. Rory can’t be sure, but at this point what can anything hurt. Kurt’s been knocked to the ground and he needs as many hands as possible to help him back up. To dust him off and set him in the right direction. 

“You seem so sure,” Kurt’s voice is soft. “I wouldn’t even know where to begin.” 

“Just start,” Rory matches his tone, wanting so badly for Kurt to understand. “And I’m sure because I know. Your future is so much more than you can imagine, Kurt. You’re going to go on to conquer the world.”

“This is all very —  _nice_  — advice Rory, but—” Kurt looked at Blaine. “It’s my future and I will figure it out.” Rory felt the reassurance in the tone that reminds him that his Dad has always been the one in control. The one who knows the way ahead. “No one can know their future, and that is probably for the best. I mean if I knew that Blaine and I were going to be living in New York in ten years with two kids-“

“Or 27.” Blaine joked, bumping into him.

“More like three then.” Kurt shook his head at Blaine’s eagerness and continued on his train of thought. “If I knew all that where would I get the motive to work for it? To work on our relationship and find new career paths.” That last bit comes out bitter, but Rory can see Blaine nudge him, reminding him to stay positive. 

“So you wouldn’t want me to tell you, I mean if I could, what you were going to do in the next, say twenty years?” Kurt shook his head at Rory’s words, smiling. 

“No, and I don’t see how you could, regardless. I mean as much as Blaine might wish otherwise, time travel has yet to be invented. And I doubt it will be. I mean, if it was I could be sitting here talking to my future kids instead of you two!”

“Hey, what makes you think that they wouldn’t be here to talk to me?” Blaine pretends to pout. 

“Please. Everyone knows that you’ll never change.”

“I could! I could be…” Blaine searches for something completely off base. “A firefighter! Or one of those CSI people.”

“You? Really? You can hardly watch me make meatloaf, let alone deal with crime scenes.” Kurt rolls his eyes. 

Rory doesn’t say anything, just smiles at them as they continue to bicker about a life that seems far off and imaginary to them. They’ll get everything they want and more. But they already seem to know that. 

They’re Kurt and Blaine Hummel-Anderson and he knows they’ll be just fine. 


End file.
